Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica
by Copper Hikari
Summary: The rogue Xulbey arrives on Earth with one goal: erase the Incubator civilization from existence. Madoka will find herself once again at the center of a cosmic power struggle, but as the girls are increasingly aware, something isn't right in this world...
1. Capable of Anything

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

–Capable of Anything

Sayaka Miki stood frozen as a statue, her thin knees buckling and her arms trembling as the door to the Witch's domain closed in front of her. With an alien cry and the unmistakable sensation of being pulled headfirst into quicksand, the barrier sealed shut and disappeared. It was nothing short of impossible. And yet, if anyone ever walked past the convenience store across from Hitomi's house again and turned the corner, they would see a perfectly ordinary alleyway. Trash bags and empty beer bottles littered the floor, but nothing else out of the realm of normality.

They would never see the creature that grabbed Sayaka, pulled her into a nightmarish hell realm, and nearly ate her alive.

"Are you hurt?"

The words were so distant—

"Are you okay? Can you hear me?"

The blond girl's hand reached out and gripped Sayaka's shoulder like a vice, gently shaking her back and forth looking for any kind of response. This wasn't a normal girl. There was no possibility of this being a normal human being, under _any_ defnintion. Sayaka had seen it all herself: the girl had been dressed in her sailor uniform one minute, and then in some kind of bright golden tunic with a matching feathered cap the next. Her guns had come from nowhere, firing bullets into a void of unmistakable evil. The overkill canon weapon she used at the end seemed to come right out of a comic book.

Sayaka struggled to find the words.

"I'm fine," she cleared her throat. "Fit as a fiddle."

The other girl flashed a bright smile. The powerful yellow of her current, obscure outfit paled in comparison. "That's great," she exhaled. "You had me worried for a minute."

'Worried for a minute'. There had been things crawling on walls that flipped up and down and turned in directions that probably didn't exist anywhere else on Earth, and she was only slightly concerned.

Sayaka made the only decision she could understand: she turned around and walked out of the alley. What was there to say? How could she find the words to talk about what had happened? Sayaka felt a 'thank you' would be almost offensive.

She could feel the other girl's stare on her back.

"Wait. It's not safe yet—"

"I'm thankful for…I…" Sayaka gave up on finding something to say, "But I just want to go home. I don't…this was a dream, right? It's a dream. I fell asleep in class again. Madoka's gonna wake me up any minute now. I know it. Wake up. Wake up.

"Wake up," she whispered desperately.

Sayaka braced herself on the grimy sidewall of the convenience store and blinked her eyes, trying her hardest to believe her own lie.

"You can't go home," the golden girl said she extended her arms outward with a ballerina's grace, "Not yet."

A flash of light erupted behind Sayaka, beginning and ending quicker than the flash of a camera or a jolt of lightning in the sky. When Sayaka turned around, the girl had returned to wearing the standard schoolgirl uniform. Her powerful blond curls fell to her shoulders with precision.

"You're Sayaka Miki," the girl said. "Am I right?"

Sayaka's heart jumped out of her chest and ran down the street. This was just too much. She faced the girl, hands clenched and lips tight.

"How do you know my name?" She nearly shouted.

"There's no need to be defensive, Sayaka."

"What are you talking about? You have guns _everywhere_! And don't call me by my first name unless I say so!" Sayaka spat.

The girl took a deep breath and met Sayaka's eyes dead-on. "Miss Miki," she rephrased, "My name is Mami Tomoe. I've been looking after you for some time. I wanted to make this easier on you, but when the Witch appeared, I had to act.

"Truth be told, I'm sorry I didn't plan this better. I feel kind of stupid," she added with a melancholy giggle.

Sayaka relaxed slightly. Whatever Mami was, she definitely didn't seem threatening. You just had to ignore the arsenal of weaponry she had commanded seconds ago and focus on Mami's lighthearted attitude.

Sayaka didn't share her new friend's optimism. "Looking for me?" She repeated.

"Yes." Mami suddenly adopted a serious tone. "Something's going to happen to your friend, and we—"

"Madoka?" Sayaka's voice shot up like a rocket.

"Madoka Kaname."

"What's going to happen to her? Those things in there…in the wall, or wherever they went, are they going to do something? You can't let that happen!" Panic took hold of Sayaka and didn't let go.

Mami held up a small, pristine hand. "Stay calm, Sayaka. Nothing's happened to Madoka yet, but there will be some bad people coming for her soon. We decided that you were the best person to come to for help. From what I've seen, you know her the best out of her immediate peers and you can help us the most effectively."

Sayaka nodded along to the parts that made sense. Madoka's other close friend, Hitomi, had started cram school a few weeks ago. She didn't have the time for either Sayaka or Madoka; as a result, two of them grew closer every day.

Mami jubilantly walked past Sayaka, accidentally brushing her yellow locks against Sayaka's short sapphire hair.

"We should go someplace with more people," Mami said. "It's too quiet here. This isn't safe. You don't get attacked in a crowded place, you know." She might as well have been talking about a song she liked for all of the fear in her words.

Mami had the kind of voice where anything she said could be taken in two different ways. On the one hand, Sayaka felt compelled to believe this girl that had killed hellspawn and knew her and Madoka by name. On the other hand, every word that came from Mami's mouth was liquid butterscotch in its consistent sweetness.

"Okay," Sayaka said.

…

Standing over the water fountain in the park, watching her impeccable reflection ripple in the clear water, Alice felt at peace. The relaxing fountain sounds and the sense of absolute solitude afforded by a park in a crowded city had no equal when it came to calming her nerves.

"You don't have anything to be afraid of," Xulbey resounded in Alice's head. The Incubator walked along the fountain's edge, its deep green fur somehow keeping perfectly dry. "It's not like I'm sending you into a death trap or anything. It's perfectly safe."

Alice's fingers tickled her violet Soul Gem, hanging from the charm bracelet on her slim wrist. The color overshadowed the rest of her reflection, casting it in a murky shade.

"I don't like this," Alice admitted with a downcast expression as the corners of her mouth pulled taut. "Puella Magi are all on the same side, aren't we? And I don't know this one. I don't even know her as a girl; how am I supposed to just _hate_ her?" 

"It's easy. Remember that she's the harbinger of doom." Xulbey's pulsating yellow eyes drilled through Alice like a warm knife through particularly low-grade butter. "Isn't that all you need to know? Puella Magi protect people from harm. This is how we do it."

The words felt like a wrench in Alice's tiny stomach. To attack a girl in middle school…it didn't feel right. "She's not a witch yet—"

"She will be!" Xulbey's thoughts grew louder in her mind, echoing through all five of her senses, "And trust me, we're not the first to get this idea. If we don't start now, then it will fail again and nothing's going to change."

A pause.

"Because after all, isn't that what this is all about? Change! A new world order," the Incubator said as it leapt up to Alice's broad shoulders, much too broad for her slim frame and tiny breasts. Xulbey purple tail draped around Alice's arm like the perfect high-brow accessory. "You've got your own reasons too, remember?"

Alice was silent.

"Precisely. This is simply how we do it. Trust me, Alice." His smile somehow seemed more genuine despite never changing. "Isn't this what you wanted?"

Alice sat on the fountain edge as Xulbey crawled to the top of her head of thick, curly mahogany hair. Her immediate woes were dispelled with a sigh.

"Fine…what's her name?"

…

"Madoka's responsible for all of that?"

Mami ate another French fry and dunked it in the meager container of sugar-blasted ketchup. "Not yet," she said before popping it into her mouth. "Madoka herself is entirely normal. I'm not good at explaining this part though…Kyubey, can you take it from here?"

The Incubator Kyubey leapt from Mami's lap and sat on the table, giving the overwhelmed Sayaka his undivided attention.

"Remember what I told you about Soul Gems, Sayaka?"

It took Sayaka a minute to adjust to having another being's complete sentences projected into her mind, but she was getting used to it quickly enough. She took another bite of the cheeseburger on her tray as she eyed the yellow Gem on Mami's finger. "I think I got it," she said. "They're the power of a magical gi—I mean, a Puella Magi—that gets created after forming a contract."

"A contract for making a wish. Exactly. Madoka's powers are not within the normal range of a Puella Magi, though. For reasons I do not understand, the Soul Gem she would produce would be capable of anything. It'd be stronger than everything I've ever encountered," he said honestly.

Sayaka spotted the vagueness instantly. "Capable of _anything_? Madoka? You're joking."

"I'm not." Kyubey's piercing red eyes were either incredibly genuine or an amazing poker face. "If Madoka were to contract with me, the power she would wield could let her become a goddess."

"I get that much. What's so bad about this Xulbey guy, then?" The name felt different, disturbingly so.

"That's the problem we're facing right now. If Madoka contracts through Xulbey, she will be open to his influence, and I can tell you right now that we don't want that."

Sayaka couldn't resist asking. "Why not?"

Mami raised her hand, for a brief moment looking positively grade school. "Xulbey isn't a normal Incubator. He's on the run from the rest of the Incubators. He defected from them, and he's looking for a way to fight back."

"Contracting Madoka Kaname would be the ultimate weapon against our people," Kyubey finally began moving again, looking toward the plate of fries and wagging his long, swirling tail. "She could kill anything with just a suggestion from Xulbey. You realize, I can't allow that."

Something didn't add up for Sayaka. "Fine, but why do you need me?" She folded her arms. "Just go contract Madoka first or whatever, and be done with it."

"I can't."

"Because..?"

"It's not safe."

This was going nowhere. "Why isn't it safe?"

"Because, Sayaka. Xulbey is sending his own Puella Magi here to capture Madoka Kaname."

That was a game-changer.

Sayaka sat up straight and brushed an offending blue lock from her eyes. "Capture her?"

Mami swallowed a mouthful of fries and wiped her hands on the paper napkins on her tray. "Kyubey doesn't know how many Puella Magi Xulbey has working for him, and I cannot protect Madoka alone. At least, I don't think I'd survive for too long if I tried." Again, the optimism was morbid rather than comforting.

"Then you just need to build up your ranks!" Sayaka leaned forward, forgetting about her lunch entirely. "Get more girls contracted and take this Xul-whoozits down! You just have to find—"

She had answered her own question.

A painful silence passed as Sayaka realized what they were getting at. Telling her about the Soul Gems, about the powers and responsibilities of the Puella Magi, about Incubators and Madoka's role in all of it wasn't just complimentary lunch conversation.

It was a mission briefing.

Sayaka looked at the blindly cheerful Mami and the unwavering Kyubey, knowing the question but uncertain of her answer.

"You're joking. You want me to—"

"That's right!" Kyubey leapt to less than an inch from her face and filled her mind with the command that would change her life.

"If we're going to protect the life of Madoka Kaname and the lives of everyone in this universe, I need you to contract with me and become a Puella Magi!"


	2. Mysterious Transfer Student

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-Mysterious Transfer Student

"I can't do it," Sayaka said in jumble of mixed emotions, keeping her calm in the face of the alien Incubator. "You're basically asking me to be a superhero…I'm not that person—"

"Under normal circumstances, that _would_ be what I'm asking," Kyubey agreed, "But this time is different. Your friend and my people are in immediate danger. The faster you wish for something and contract with me, the better."

The pile of fries had somehow vanished inside Mami's petite figure. She dabbed at her mouth with a napkin and tossed it aside. "You shouldn't rush too much, though, Miss Miki," she added. "The wish decides your powers as a Puella Magi."

"So if I wish for a hamburger, I could end up with the power to cook hamburgers all the time?"

"That wouldn't be very helpful, I'd imagine," Kyubey added with a sarcastic chuckle.

Night had snuck up on the trio as they talked inside the restaurant, coloring the skyline of Mitakihara City a dark, neon purple against the lights of a modern metropolis. Mami looked outside and her eyes widened, as though she had never seen the moon before.

"When did it get this late?" She asked nobody in particular. "Sayaka, I should get you home." It felt like a terrible time to end the conversation. They were just getting to the Sayaka-gets-cool-powers bit.

Sayaka picked up on yet another nuance of her situation. "You know where I live? Talk about invasion of privacy," she tried to sound less bothered by it than she actually was. Had Mami been stalking her this whole time?

"It was only for your protection. I'd rather avoid having to save your life again, if I can help it," Mami's sincerity shined through. It wasn't about fighting Witches being annoying and deadly; it was about legitimately not wanting harm to come to Sayaka.

Mami threw their trash away and put sat their trays on the garbage can as they left.

"For the time being, I'd like you to keep an eye on Madoka," Kyubey said as he rode on Mami's shoulders. "At the very least. It would be more than helpful.

Sayaka nodded. Keep and eye on Madoka. She did enough of that during her normal, day-to-day life. How hard could that be?

"Mami?" Sayaka asked.

"Yes, Miss Miki?"

"Sorry about before. You can call me Sayaka."

Mami nodded happily, making sure to avoid passing any alleys as they walked.

…

Sleeping was number one on the short list of things Sayaka could do without any actual effort, followed closely by eating, with being named 'Sayaka' a close third. That night, though, she hadn't slept a wink. Her thoughts wouldn't stay still long enough to fade into unconsciousness. It wasn't without good cause: at any moment, Madoka could be attacked by a power neither of them understood.

That was the gist of it, right? If Mami wasn't around, Madoka should basically be thought of as in danger. That wasn't Kyubey's exact phrasing, but he might as well have said that. Sayaka needed to find the one miracle she wanted in all the world _fast,_ so that she could become a protector for Madoka…but how does one find what to wish for? Was she supposed to just wake up one day with a light bulb on over her head?

After a night of lying in bed and staring at a blank ceiling, Sayaka only drifted to sleep just as the alarm went off for the next day. She reached out for the alarm clock's snooze button; her hand met warm fur.

"Wake up, Sayaka!" Kyubey's voice bulldozed through her peaceful mind, "You're going to be late! Late! Late!"

Sayaka tried to protest, but the words came out in some language resembling caveman grunts.

"I can't let you sleep any longer," Kyubey leapt onto Sayaka's tangled blue hair, his tail tickling the back of her neck as it moved back and forth. "You have to keep an eye on Madoka for me, remember?"

Yesterday's events came flooding back.

"You may not be a Puella Magi yet, but you can still help us, at least until you know what to wish for."

Sayaka pushed herself up from the warm, familiar comfort of her bed and fought to regain consciousness. It wasn't an enjoyable struggle.

She went through the normal routine by dint of sheer muscle memory. Sayaka would attack the bathroom for twenty minutes, get dressed, make sure her hair fell the way it was supposed to, and eat an unsatisfying breakfast in that exact order. By the time she was conscious enough to face the day's challenges, Sayaka was ten minutes out of the house and on the way to class.

Kyubey sat on Sayaka's small, blue book bag as she walked. According to Mami, only the two of them could see this particular Incubator or hear his thoughts. Sayaka had to admit: it was pretty convenient.

Sayaka walked slowly, taking in the tall trees and the glistening, ravishing lake that marked the route to Mitakihara High School. She swung her arm back and forth, taking slow strides and bobbing along to a song in her head.

"Why are you going so slow?" Kyubey nagged, "We're not going to make it in time!"

"We never had a chance of _that_," Sayaka yawned. "If I ran now, I'd just interrupt the morning announcements and probably get yelled at. This way, I'll just be fashionably late."

"You'll still be late!"

"But I'll be fashionable while being late, so it all works out!" Sayaka felt Kyubey's disappointment as she continued her slow strides. She decided to pick up the pace: the school bell had just rang as Sayaka approached the building.

Looking like something out of a different time-period where postmodernism was the name of the game, Mitakihara High School's main building was almost entirely composed of windowpanes. The steel infrastructure kept the complex structurally indestructible as it reflected and refracted light from all directions. Sayaka could see other late students rushing to their classes from where she stood.

By the time Sayaka had actually stepped through the main doors of the school, homeroom had come and gone, paving the way for a brief break before actual lectures. Students filled the halls, chatting with one another about schoolwork and afterschool activities and their opinions about new songs, while teachers slowly entered the classrooms and restored order.

A certain Madoka Kaname sat at her desk, furiously scribbling into her small blue notebook as though nothing else existed, anywhere. It wasn't anything special by any stretch of the imagination, and her father had bought five more when they were cheap before school started this year. Still, this notebook was hers, and Madoka filled it with her private thoughts and desires. Teachers could only make her study as long as classes were in session; the next ten minutes were designated Madoka time. She hadn't noticed Sayaka's absence until the sapphire-haired delinquent entered the room with little fanfare.

"Hey, Madoka!" Sayaka said as she walked down the row of chairs and came to her own. Madoka's head snapped up with an almost spring-loaded force, sending her pink pigtails floundering about. "Did I miss anything good?"

Madoka slammed the notebook shut and shoved it under her desk with an uncanny speed. Her cheeks were still flushed crimson when she turned to Sayaka. "Good morning!" She tried to hide the surprise in her voice.

"Stop looking so embarrassed. I'm not interested in reading that diary thing. It's private, right?"

Madoka nodded, relieved. Sayaka was the only person she knew to be so understanding.

"So…what did I miss?"

Madoka's lack of attention was brought to light as she struggled to recall the first ten minutes of the day. "Well," she put a finger to her mouth, "I don't _think_ there's anything important. We have a substitute today for History…Oh!" Her eyes opened wide, "We got a new student in our class."

"A new student, huh? Don't tell me she's another weirdo."

"Sayaka! Don't say things like that out loud!"

It was the truth, though. Out of the corner of her eye, Madoka could always see Homura Akemi, the girl that had transferred into their school and never said a word. Every girl in their class had tried to become her friend, asking her what her likes and dislikes were and what boys she thought were cute, but Homura either ignored the interrogations or simply walked away in the middle of the conversation. The long black hair and silent, almost somber expression on her round face didn't help to make her more approachable.

"She's nothing like that," Madoka said. "The new girl, I mean. She's not from around here."

"What, like, she's from Tokyo or something?"

"No, she's way farther than that! I think the teacher said she was Canadian." Madoka's eyes lit up as she finally remembered the teacher's words. "Her name is Alice," she added.

Sayaka mouthed the name. "Alice. That _is_ a strange name."

"I don't think she's a strange person, though. She went outside and started talking to people right after homeroom. She'll probably want to meet you during lunch!"

"I'm thrilled," Sayaka said in a droll monotone. Truth be told, mysterious transfer students were more tolerable than the eager-to-please transfer students; the former didn't bug you into submission. Madoka always gave people the benefit of the doubt when she first met them; Sayaka didn't feel like offering the luxury.

Instead of meeting a new girl, Sayaka opted to sit in her desk and put her head down, hoping to rest her eyes for a few more precious minutes. Madoka's notebook opened back up and the focused scribbling re-commenced.

"Sayaka! Can you hear me?"

Mami's voice shot into her mind just like Kyubey's, with a thunderous, crystal-clear quality.

"Don't say anything out loud! You can just think things to me or Kyubey here; my classroom is just on the other side of the hall. I'm just checking in. Are you keeping an eye on Madoka?"

Sayaka struggled to think a linear sentence. It was a surprisingly new experience. "She's right here," she finally 'said'. "We're both fine."

"Great! Let me know right away if anything looks suspicious."

"Roger that." Sayaka felt like a three-way walkie talkie had been jammed into her brain without her permission. She decided not to ask how much of her thoughts were being broadcast at any given moment. It would only make her even more paranoid that she already was, and that helped absolutely nothing. She could handle being followed, and even having Puella Magi coming for her best friend; thought privacy might have been a bit much.

"One more thing!" Mami said, "Can you come see me at lunch? I want to tell you something important. Don't let Madoka follow you! It's top-secret."

…

On a typical day, Madoka and Sayaka would sit on the rooftop and talk about whatever came to mind. Sometimes, it would be about simple things like the weather and how much the fall time change annoyed them; on occasion, the girls would wax philosophical and wonder what the actual point of going to junior high school was. One of them would bring up the obvious 'to get into a good high school' card and kill the conversation there, but it was fun to debate the metaphysics of it all once in a while.

Instead of going up the main staircase to the roof, Sayaka went down to the entrance of the main school building to meet with Mami. It wasn't the most secure place in the world, but Sayaka remembered what Mami said about meeting in a crowded place. The odds of being attacked were slim in a crowded space. The logic proved true already: they'd had a completely confidential conversation in a fast-food restaurant.

She found Mami standing by the chain link fence surrounding the school grounds, just past the last of the faculty buildings. Other students sat in groups on the lawn, eating lunch and talking about juvenile nothings, while Mami's sense of defined purpose stood out like a sore thumb. She leaned against the fence and looked out at the street with wistful eyes as Kyubey lay against her calf.

Sayaka waved to Mami—or rather, to both Mami and Kyubey—and stood with them. The fence wasn't nearly as new and pristine as the rest of their glass fortress of a high school. The metal had rusted and was all but broken in many places. Sayaka ran her hand across a section; the sound was akin to a chalkboard on a bad day.

She missed the roof immediately.

"Thanks for coming," Mami said, "I know I'm probably pulling you away from something important, but there's something I need you to know."

There was only one thing to ask about. "Is it Madoka?"

Mami pursed her lips and shook her head back and forth. She looked around, making sure that the rest of the students were fully engrossed in their own banal conversations before she continued.

"There are other Puella Magi in the school," Mami thought aloud. She cleared her throat and started speaking normally, "I don't know who they are, but I thought I should tell you. It's not safe to be seen with me."

Rather than inspire panic or fear, Sayaka wondered how that could have even happened. "How did you find that out?" Sayaka asked. What, did she have a Puella Magi radar somewhere?

"I've been a Puella Magi for quite a while," Mami answered. "After a while, you can feel the presence of other girls around you. It's not like I can get an exact count, but," she paused to make her words as innocuous as possible, "They _are_ here, so be on your guard."

Sayaka wondered how someone could look so calm while being simultaneously trapped in a school with potential attackers. Another worry suddenly came up. "Mami, they can't hear our…" she pointed to her head, "You know. Can they?"

"Definitely not!" Kyubey chimed in, tilting his head up to the both of them. "You can only hear us if I've contracted you to me, or if I simply allow it. The two of you are the only people that meet that requirement.

"Still, it might be dangerous to be seen with Mami," he added.

It made sense: if someone were looking for another Puella Magi around Madoka, they'd examine her best friend thoroughly as well. Sayaka suddenly felt as though the whole school were watching her, waiting for her secrets to be revealed. She folded her arms.

Mami pushed off of the fence, bouncing to her feet with her hair springing perfectly along. "That's all," she said with a curt smile. "I'll be in touch!" She walked back into the main building and disappeared behind the glass and steel, walking her usual peppy walk.

Before she knew where she was even walking to, Sayaka had begun moving. There was no definite destination; she had to move. Anywhere, somewhere, somehow.

There were Puella Magi inside the school.

Mami could pull an arsenal of weapons from her sleeves on a simple whim; there were girls like _that_ coming for Madoka, and they were so near…this was the definition of insane improbability.

How did that happen so _fast_? From the way Mami and Kyubey were talking about it, this whole thing with Madoka had to be recent. You can't get your personal strike force of magical girls inside a school without people knowing, can you? And if you put the paranoia away for just a second, what's supposed to happen? Was Sayaka supposed to make this contract and protect Madoka for the foreseeable future?

How long was this supposed to last?

…What was she supposed to wish for? Could she kill two birds in one stone and wish for Madoka to be safe?

Somehow, that seemed a bit too easy.

Sayaka was back inside the main building and halfway up to the roof when footsteps came from behind her. She had allowed herself to be utterly alone in the hallways. Sayaka kicked herself, making a note to never do that again.

"Sayaka…you're Madoka Kaname's friend. Correct?" Sayaka had only heard a few phrases from that voice, but could instantly spot it.

Homura Akemi seemed utterly uninterested in her own question, echoing the deep, lonely lavender in her eyes. Sayaka told herself to just breathe. It would all be okay if she would just breathe.

"Yeah, I am," she faced the utterly statuesque Homura, "What of it?"

"Whatever you think you're doing by trying to protect her, stop it," Homura commanded. "Your help isn't required. _I_ am her guardian."

_Of course_: the mysterious transfer student. It made so much sense that it was almost criminal. Who else would a possible suspect for evil magical girl be, anyway?

Sayaka ignored the instantaneous, kneejerk reaction to broadcast her thoughts to Mami. How long it would take for Mami to show up? And after that, Sayaka didn't know what would happen after two Puella Magi meet one another. She didn't think it would look very diplomatic.

"You're a Puella Magi." Sayaka noticed that saying it made the fact real. "You're working for that Xulbey guy, aren't you?"

"Xulbey?" She said it as more of a clarification that a question.

"Don't play dumb!" A wave of courage flooded Sayaka's veins, giving her a red-hot will and a matching disposition. "You're after Madoka's powers. I know all about it, and I'm not letting you take her, no matter what you say or do to me."

Never mind that the whole 'what you do to me' part could end very, very badly.

Homura stopped, as though someone had paused her with a remote control. Her breathing had ceased completely, her eyes had closed, and she had become utterly still. Sayaka wondered if this was some kind of a pre-emptive strike.

She struggled to stay brave, not daring to move or run away, especially not after that speech. Sayaka opened her mouth for another boast of bravado—

Homura leapt forward with the force of a tank—

Before Sayaka's eyes, the entire classroom behind Homura blew apart in a blaze of orange flames. The steel fragmented into bits of shrapnel; the glass soared across the field, falling and cracking on the solid ground. Smoke stung her eyes; the smell of burning metal and rubber shocked her sinuses. Homura had her pinned on the hard tile floor, safely out of the way of the flying shards of glass furniture and the ashes of thick, burning schoolbooks.

Sayaka closed her eyes, hoping the pinprick sensation would fade soon.

"Stay here," Homura said as she slowly got up, staying low to the ground and keeping a hand over her mouth. She tried waving the rest of the smoke away with her free hand, but to no avail. Smoke poured forth from the hallway like a waterfall of black air and fire.

A lone voice called forth from inside the wreckage.

"He said it would be easy," she said in a high, nasally voice that could make babies cry, "But I didn't think it would be _that _easy. You just turn on each other like that! It's so funny. I wish I'd gotten that on camera."

The black cloud cleared just enough for Homura to spy the powerful verdant glow from the other side. An emerald green illuminated the former classrooms like a lighthouse beacon. Homura held her stance.

"You're working for Xulbey, I imagine?" She asked, her question floating with a lackadaisical mood. "That would make sense."

The light faded with the smoke, slowly but surely. "I wouldn't say I'm working for him," the words had a wailing quality as it teased behind the dark curtain. "There's someone he wanted to talk to, and so I'm helping him out. This shouldn't take too long."

The red flag went off above Sayaka's head.

"Mami!" She thought as loud as she could.

"I know!" Mami sounded hurried: Sayaka could feel her heart racing and her feet pounding faster and faster, "I'm coming!"

"No, don't! I'll be fine! It's Madoka, on the roof. Xulbey's going after Madoka!"

Homura lowered her hands from her face. The same confidence that made Mami so cheerful gave Homura an utterly frightening appearance. Sayaka crouched, utterly helpless and watching from afar.


	3. A Walking Apocalyptic Catastrophe

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-A Walking Apocalyptic Catastrophe

The neon light shot forth from the blazing havoc before the girls—

The green whip raced out of the classroom and snapped itself around Homura's neck, digging into her skin with its strong cowhide. Her body pulled up off the ground, feet dangling and body flailing as the whip moved of its own accord.

The attacker revealed herself as she stepped out of the smoke cloud cover. Each step was a walk down an imaginary runway. Clad in a deep green corset with a matching skirt that twirled around her knees in a rhythmic dance, holding jewel-encrusted end of the whip in gloved hand and twirling her long, straight hair with the other—

—a complete stranger, to both Sayaka and Homura. She laughed at their confused faces.

"I'm an underclassman, so don't bother yourselves with names," she laughed. "The name's Aoki Chika. It's nice to meet you, miss…" She tugged on the whip handle ever so slightly, keeping Homura suspended in the air, "What is it? Cat's got your tongue?"

One limp hand rose to Homura's neck, gripping the whip to give her just enough breathing room as Chika tugged, the lash cutting into her windpipe. Homura shoved her fingers between her neck and the magical weapon, pulling it apart with her bare hands—

"Akemi."

Chika held a hand to her ear. "Come again?"

"Homura Akemi," she clarified. Her voice had become stifled and chafed, yet filled with a damning focus. "That's my name. Commit it to memory."

The bravado went ignored; Chika rolled her eyes and shrugged her bony, clammy shoulders. "You're bold, aren't you, Akemi? Especially considering I'm the one with the whi—"

In the time it took Sayaka to blink, Homura had grasped the rest of the whip in her strong fingers and pulled herself down toward Chika.

The other hand dropped from her neck and balled into a fist—

Chika slammed into the wall from the blow, stumbling on her heels and losing her balance. She fell against a windowpane, cracking it as her head slid down to leave a faint red trail. A dazed hand struggled to find Chika's screaming temple as the other tried raising the whip again; the effort was in vain.

An instantaneous light—

Homura didn't move a muscle; Sayaka would have at least seen _something_ move toward Chika. It was as though the girl had simply _materialized_. Homura simplyappeared before the green Puella Magi, clothing changed and something shining on her left arm—

Chika looked up just in time to eat a face full of metal. Her head craned back and soared further down the hall, her body skidding on the tile floor before slamming into the wall on the opposite side. Paint chips and plaster fell from the wall in the impact.

Sayaka saw her third Puella Magi.

Homura's uniform had vanished, replaced with a black dress and leggings with ornate, angular patterns all over. The shield had mounted to her left hand; a glistening purple gem had been embedded in the other, complimented by a complicated tattoo design. Sayaka recognized the magnificent luster from Mami's orientation: it was Homura's own Soul Gem.

Homura's eyes glanced to Sayaka, scanning fast for any wounds of the girl before turning back to her unfortunate company. Homura dug a hand into the shield, seemingly accessing a space that didn't exist, only to remove it a second later with none other than an automatic handgun. Her hand gripped the handle with a striking familiarity.

Homura aimed the weapon—

Chika laugh was more of a witch's menacing cackle. "Too slow!"

Chika raised the whip handle up above her head and slammed it toward the ground. The second the whip chord hit the expensive, reflective floor tile it had its morphed shape, changing into a translucent green barrier surrounding her fallen form. The bullets erupted from Homura's weapon and flew into the barrier, stopping dead in their tracks and hanging like mounted pictures on a wall.

Sayaka covered her ears as the sound barraged them incessantly—

The entire clip had emptied before Homura released the trigger. She tossed the smoking gun to the side and reached into the shield for another.

"Sayaka," her voice boomed in Sayaka's head.

Thoughts? Only Mami and Kyubey could get into her mind; how could Homura—

"Sayaka, get up now! You have to touch my shield. There's no time."

The green barrier began to fade. Chika took to her feet, both hands gripping the whip handle like an executioner would her axe.

"Do it! Now!"

Sayaka had become utterly paralyzed. She had fallen back down like a deer caught in the headlights, lungs quickly breathing in smoke and debris. Her head sounded a torturous alarm; her ears rang and couldn't stop. If Sayaka could hear anything but her own fear, it still wouldn't be enough to get her moving.

There were other things to focus on—

Homura pulled another automatic weapon from behind the shield just as the barrier came down. Chika bounded for Homura with a tornado's gust of speed, whip cracking on the ground in her wake. Bullets seemingly bounced off of her like a ball against a brick wall as she moved.

Homura held the shield forward and braced herself—

The resulting impact shattered the glass windowpanes, showering the girls with falling jagged edges and scattering the bits of charred desks and chairs.. Homura stood still and unmovable, both arms bracing the shield as Chika forced a new weapon form against it: the whip had become a giant hammer, with rose thorns decorating the edges and a mighty tree trunk for the head. Chika hovered in the air, suspended by the hilt over Homura.

"You're surprisingly good at this," Chika's surprise belonged at a child's birthday party as she opened presents. "Nobody told me you'd be good at—"

Homura took the banter for what it was: an opening.

She shifted the shield back just barely an inch, but with the same speed—or lack thereof—she had demonstrated before.

The hammer moved to land again on the metal surface—

With a whirl of her arm, Homura's shield whipped upward at the hammer, tossing Chika up through the ceiling and into the bruised sky. She acted fast: Homura reached into her shield and removed a higher caliber weapon.

Both hands gripped a heavy-duty rocket launcher and aimed it upward.

Sayaka regained her senses from the impact, watching the girl in green drift in the black clouds overhead. She saw the rocket launcher and raced to her feet.

"Homura!" She couldn't hear her own voice with her compromised hearing, "You'll hurt her!"

Homura took a quick and precise aim—

"Don't! You'll kill her!"

Wasn't that the goal?

Homura's conflicted lavender eyes looked at the pleading Sayaka, then back through the eyesight—

Homura put the rocket launcher back into the shield, watching as Chika floated through the air, flailing the whip around into who knew what other form.

"Go to Madoka," she ordered, thoughts racing for another plan of action.

"She's okay," Sayaka rushed, "There's another Puella Magi who's—"

"Mami Tomoe's working for another Incubator," Homura shouted, too busy to debate her own instructions, "She can't be trusted!"

It felt like a joke. Mami had the untrustworthiness of an angel. "What are you—"

"It's too late for me to send you there with my power, so you'll have to run," Homura hurried, clenching her fists. The knuckles cracking somehow reached Sayaka's ears. "Find Madoka and get her out of here. If you don't hurry, you're inviting yourself to your own funeral."

Homura tensed her muscles and crouched slightly, still fixated on the green point in the sky—

The ground erupted into a crater of steel and tile as Homura leapt straight into the air, shield first. Sayaka covered her face with her arms, struggling to breathe through the flames and dust. Crashing and exploding noises carried from above the school at a rapid clip as Homura and Chika bounced into one another, striking at high speeds.

Sayaka watched the blips in the heavens with a fearful awe.

Was this what Puella Magi were capable of?

Was this what Mami—

Mami!

Sayaka focused her mind, trying to call out to either of her companions. They weren't in reach; Sayaka prayed that Mami had found Madoka in time.

The one side of the building had been sealed off by none other than the towering inferno of a classroom. Sayaka ran past the crater, the glass, and the empty bullet shells down the opposite side of the hallway, racing against time for the rooftop.

…

A protective, unflinching Mami stood in front of Madoka, one arm over her and the other prepared for anything. The fight was only a couple hundred yards from the girls, as Homura leapt from one surface to the other, matching Chika blow for blow. Shockwaves flew through them with rapidity, sending Mami's curls dancing with Madoka's pigtails in synchronized time.

Alice stood across from them, at the other entrance to the roof, her expression unreadable. Her wide eyes showed sincerity, while her relaxed expression belied her larger, more formidable figure. She paid special attention to the gold ring on Mami's finger.

Mami cleared her throat and projected her voice over the echoes of smashed metal. "Whatever you're thinking of doing, you're going to regret it! You leave now if you know what's good for you."

Alice pulled strands of hair behind her ears.

"Let me clarify that: if you don't want to _die, _you should leave now. I won't hold back!"

The Soul Gem at Alice's wrist called her to battle. After all, what Xulbey said was law. This was an order, and orders _are_ orders, but…nothing about this agreed with Alice. Madoka Kaname, the girl who wore pigtails and sketched into her notebook on the roof of school…How was she supposed to kill _that_? It'd be easier to kill a hurt bunny rabbit.

The sounds of combat grew louder as the three of them stood, waiting.

Footsteps came from the stairwell behind Madoka and Mami. Sayaka burst through the door, her uniform stained and legs scraped and bleeding from maneuvering the school. She hadn't felt the almost bone-deep gashes and wasn't planning to focus on them anytime soon.

Madoka jumped at the door's opening and turned to her friend.

"Sayaka!" Madoka cried, "What's going on? Who's attacking us?" She stopped and took what felt like a long look at the battle damage from earlier; Madoka's jaw fell wide open. "Sayaka, you're hurt!"

Sayaka ignored her friend's well-natured comments, studying the focused Alice and the prepared Mami.

"Let me guess," Sayaka said, "You're a Puella Magi too, right? Transfer students…Geez…"

Alice recalculated the situation. Two girls protecting Madoka Kaname, and a third fighting Chika? Even if the Madoka girl was innocent, the importance of the situation couldn't be ignored. Before, she could feign ignorance at the Kaname girl's importance and get away with not attacking her. This third girl dashed the excuse, leaving her without much else to do.

Alice raised her wrist, letting the charm bracelet chime as she moved. "Stand aside," Alice said to Mami. "This is for the good of our reality. You're protecting a walking apocalyptic catastrophy, Puella Magi. I will not—"

"Whatever Xulbey said to you is a lie," Mami interrupted. "If you kill me, Xulbey's going to contract Madoka and manipulate her, just like he's manipulating you right now."

Alice's laugh was dry and hallow. "That's exactly what Xulbey told me you'd say," she groaned. He was right after all. "There's only one way to settle this."

The Soul Gem at her wrist began to glow—

"Alice, move your ass!"

Without even looking for a speaker, Alice leapt back as far as she could, diving for the nearest stairwell. No sooner had her feet touched the ground than did Chika collide into the roof, spraying gravel and dust all over the would-be arena. A mach-speed Homura dived for her prey, only to be slammed down by the green hammer. A resounding clang of magical steel followed Homura downward, her landing damaging the rooftop in the same way.

Sayaka had thought the battle was intense before; she had missed out on nothing short of a cosmic showdown. Chika's dress had become tattered to mere shreds, with red and purple bruises replacing the cloth fabric from before. Homura looked no better: her shield had grown warped from repeated strikes, and red blotches under the black outfit told a painful story.

The two Puella Magi struggled to find their footing and gain the upper hand. Alice lowered her arm and watched, uncertain. If Chika got up, could she kill Madoka in one fell swoop? Or if the other one got up…?

Homura tried speaking, but the crimson blood in her mouth gagged her words. She spat the wad out onto the destruction before her and yelled back to Mami, her voice still worn ragged from being choked.

"Tomoe! Get over here!"

Mami stayed put—

"I need your Soul Gem's to get us out of here. Now!"

Sayaka watched Mami's expression change ever so slightly, turning determined as she nodded. She understood the plan.

Mami dashed for the fallen Homura, hand outstretched and reaching for the other girl's. Chika raced to find proper footing, to take down this other Puella Magi and put this whole misadventure to an end—

A final voice joined the obtuse meeting.

"This is Madoka Kaname," said the black Incubator as it appeared in the No Man's Land between the two groups of girls.

Xulbey materialized from seemingly nowhere as it sat with an upright, stiff posture, its tail laid flat on the ground. The disarming, disconcerting thoughts resonated through all five girls like a broadcast echo.

"It's lovely to finally meet you," He announced. "I am Xulbey. I'm sure we'll be come great friends in the near future."

Madoka had become a standing corpse, her limbs numb and her face pale. The lacerations in Sayaka's legs finally began to sting; she limped to Madoka and took her friend's freezing hand.

"Sayaka Miki, the best friend," Xulbey tilted its head just enough to be noticeable. His amused demeanor seemed completely forced. "It's nice to be able to meet you, though I'm sure you know my name already. Can I assume that idiot Kyubey's already gotten to you?"

Mami and Homura held hands, eyes closed and minds focused.

"It's a pity," Xulbey said. "You showed a lot of promise, too. I guess it's not too late for you, though."

"Too late for what?" Sayaka said, trying to buy time for whatever Mami was trying.

"Too late to be on the winning team, of course!" Xulbey gloated blissfully.

Chika had finally risen back up, using the hammer as a crutch. She wiped the blood from her mouth as her lungs fought desperately for air. Xulbey rotated his head back in the opposite direction; his tail twitched.

"You failed, Chika," he said. "I warned you: fighting an experienced Puella Magi is nothing like fighting a Witch."

"I didn't fail! I can still fight!" Chika pointed a shaky arm to the ambivalent Alice, "_She's _the reason I didn't kill her! It's her fault! She did _nothing_!"

"Please, Chika, be a _graceful_ loser," Xulbey's condescension made the moment that much more humiliating. "Homura Akemi was merely caught off-guard, and you still couldn't win.

"Mami Tomoe, however," Xulbey's neck slowly craned in her direction, sending a unique, unequivocal chill through Sayaka's core—

"Well!" He suddenly became as chipper as an autumn sunrise, "We'll just have to see about that next time!" Xulbey politely bowed his head to the unarmed girls. "I'll see you later, Madoka. It was nice to meet you as well, Sayaka.

"You're free to go now, Homura," Xulbey finished. "Say hello to Kyubey for me."

Homura eyes remained closed while Mami freed a hand. "Sayaka, Madoka, take my hand," she called. Sayaka staggered to her blond friend with all the haste she could muster, guiding an unemotional Madoka along.

The four girls were all connected.

"_Great_ friends, Madoka," Xulbey added.

Homura, Mami, Sayaka, and Madoka Kaname vanished without a trace.

...

A/N: Writing fight sequences is my number-one weakness. Any helpful suggestions for improving this scene, as well as writing fights in general, would be wonderful.


	4. Buried Alive

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-Buried Alive

The girls suddenly stood just outside Sayaka's beige, upper-middle-class apartment building. Sirens wailed in every direction, approaching and fading toward the general direction of towering smoke in the sky. The sun had started to set, despite it only just nearing noon a few moments ago. Rush hour traffic and blinding streetlights only drove the fact further home.

Fresh air soothed Sayaka's lungs, its lack of carbon monoxide feeling like a gentle caress. She wasn't sure she'd forget the taste of flaming building and rubble anytime soon.

Their battle scars were still fresh, though Sayaka's 'scars' would heal in a day with little more than a band-aid and some disinfectant. Homura, on the other hand, could barely stand. She leaned against the honey-colored wall of the complex and exhaled a concentrated, desperate wheeze of oxygen.

A clip of light shot over them; Homura returned to her unharmed school uniform, the wounds still clearly visible but her shield and other garments vanished.

Sayaka sat on the edge of the nearest flower planter outside the automatic doors home, lowering herself down with her arms to reduce strain on her overworked lower body as she realized that she had no right to complain about pain. They had been attacked in broad daylight in a crowded place. Kids were definitely hurt back at the school, some might have even…but the four of them survived.

Madoka was unharmed.

As far as things went, they were okay.

"We made it," Sayaka congratulated herself. "We're alive." She didn't care how, or if there were any immediate consequences. She was still breathing; that was enough.

…

"It's all her fault, Xulbey! I told you she wouldn't do anything, and _look! _She was absolutely worthless!" Chika whined as they sat in her tiny apartment, watching an inferno consume the school from a safe distance. Her downtown loft wasn't the most luxurious place to live, considering it had been appropriated from a long list of swindles and betrayals from helpful people, but Chika didn't think about that often.

Besides, she certainly couldn't have been the first Puella Magi that stole to make a living.

Xulbey lay under the coffee table, his eyes closed and painting the perfect picture of serenity. The contrast with his pained, pinprick, utterly _pissed_ voice was jarring. "What you mean is," he condescended, "you expected her to help you and that didn't happen. It doesn't make your failure any less yours."

Chika faced the window, arms folded and lips pursed. The cuts were cleaned out, but her bruises would take some time, even for indestructible-magical-girl standards. She quickly raced to defend her own name. "I don't see how that's supposed to—"

"Alice only had to find Madoka Kaname. Any combat responsibility rested firmly on _your_ shoulders."

Xulbey stretched out its limbs, somehow looking even more like a stuffed toy than usual. "And if I recall, you said that you were the strongest Puella Magi in the school, simply because you've fought the most creatures out of any girl in the entire city. Yet, you somehow were utterly _embarrassed_ by this Homura Akemi.

"I hope I wasn't lied to," Xulbey finished.

Chika's voice wavered with a desperate uncertainty. "Hey, that's not fair. How was I supposed to know that Akemi girl could fight like that? She had guns! Come on, what girl has _a rocket launcher_? It was outrageous."

"She didn't seem very special to me," Alice added from the couch, reclining her body across the three worn cushions and propping her feet up on the armrest. The raised voices in her mind and ears were becoming exhausting. "I don't see where you got the idea to underestimate her in the first place."

"That's because I'm more experienced than you, Alice. You've never killed a Puella Magi before, have you?" Chika offered triumphantly. She removed her headband, fondling the green Soul Gem embedded on its left side and accentuated with ribbons. "They never put up that much of a fight. Hell, they've never even been just that…_good_. Akemi's got training or something, I'm telling you, Xulbey."

"If that pitiful excuse comforts you," he sighed.

Xulbey crawled out from under the coffee table, his paws silent as he crossed the gray and stain-blasted, carpeted floor. "I'll be gone for a few hours, girls," he said as he made his way for the door.

"Why? Don't tell me you gave up—"

"I do _not_ give up, Chika," he stopped, "Although I imagine losers like you are accustomed to it."

Alice swallowed a malicious laugh.

"There is merely someone I need to gain in my favor before the tide of this battle escalates further," Xulbey said. "I'll be back in exactly two hours."

"That fast, huh? What could happen in two hours?"

"I will have a Puella Magi to specifically kill Homura Akemi."

Chika smacked her lips. That was a good answer, even if it meant her job was basically being outsourced.

"Alice, you're in charge until I return," Xulbey continued talking so that Chika couldn't oppose the decision, "Do what you want, but don't engage Kyubey's team. Keep a low profile. Understand?"

Alice nodded, looking at neither of them. Her attention seemed targeted elsewhere.

Xulbey faded through the door without another sound, thought, or otherwise. Alice let her head fall back to look at the ceiling, her neck fully extended and relaxed.

Chika's fist slammed into against the wall, scraping her knuckles a crimson red. She knew no words to express the growing sensation of humiliation filling through her; it was worse than just humiliation. It was like being disowned.

"Damnit!"

…

"Use this," Mami tossed a Grief Seed Homura's way as she eyed her bloodied uniform, "You look like you could use it."

The black marble flew to Homura's palm; she snatched it from the air and held it, watching the Grief Seed carefully. Sayaka saw the wheels turning in her head. Homura had yet to change back into a normal girl, and even then, Sayaka wasn't sure if that healed cuts and bruises. The blood dripping slowly from Homura's sleeves meant she couldn't just stay like this.

The grief seed flew back to Mami with a limp throw. "I can take care of me," Homura said. "You can take care of you."

"It's not a sign of pity or weakness, if that's what you're afraid of," Mami scolded as she twirled the Grief Seed in her fingers. "It's my thanks. I don't know where you learned to fight like that, but I could not have fought that Puella Magi _and_ teleported us away. Not without—"

"I didn't teleport us," Homura said. "Don't assume things about me, either, Tomoe."

Mami stopped trying with an innocent shrug. She put the Grief Seed in a pocket on her skirt and glared testily at the uncooperative Homura. "It's not like you'll get another chance at a free Grief Seed," Mami said. "With all of these other girls in town…things are going to get crowded, you know."

"I do. That's why Kyubey won't make Madoka contract when you take her to him."

Sayaka still held the catatonic Madoka's hand as she realized the possible ending to this situation. They had Madoka with them now; all Kyubey had to do was fulfill Madoka's wish, and it would all be over. Xulbey as a threat to the Incubators would be nullified. Sayaka didn't understand.

She asked an honest question. "Mami, what's a Grief Seed?" She hadn't gone over that in Puella Magi orientation. "What's so important about them?"

Mami answered with her stare trained on their unwilling ally. "The more magic a Puella Magi uses, the more tainted her Soul Gem becomes. If it becomes fully tainted, that girl won't be able to use her magic again."

Homura rolled her eyes as Mami continued.

"The Grief Seed dropped by a Witch will purify your Soul Gem again. There won't be enough Witches to go around soon, though," she added.

It all made sense. Madoka as a Puella Magi would be entering an already crowded Witch economy, as it were. If she were to have powers, she couldn't use them very often. The Xulbey threat would have to be nullified first so there'd be enough Grief Seeds to go around.

With a flick of her long, majestic hair, Homura walked past the other girls and started across the street. The sirens grew into a distant crescendo, then faded and silenced. Homura turned a corner and faded into the looming night.

"What a jerk," Sayaka said.

…

According to Mami, there was no danger in going back home. If any other Puella Magi had been following Sayaka, Mami would already know about it; Sayaka's home was safe as ever. After filling Madoka in on the details, the three of them were free to go back to their respective families and to regroup in the morning.

For a fourteen-year-old eighth grader who unknowingly could command the design of the universe, Madoka Kaname took the news pretty well. Mami had sat her down in another restaurant, ordered another plate of fries, and along with Sayaka, the two of them went over the basic points of the conflict facing the Incubators and the Puella Magi. Sayaka wondered how many times Mami had gone through the routine, trying not to feel less special.

Madoka was changing before the girls' eyes.

Instead of being the typical Madoka and asking the airheaded, occasionally ditsy questions that had been answered before, she only asked questions where Sayaka or Mami had gone too fast. She paid attention to all of the right words, remembered the terminology, and kept her face buried in her chest all the while. No particular phrase got any specific reaction.

When they finished talking, Mami decided it was best for her to accompany Madoka home.

"That second Puella Magi is still out there," Mami reminded them. "It's for the best."

She put a hand on Sayaka's shoulder like she had the day before. It was meant to either comfort or inspire her; Sayaka wasn't sure which one yet.

Mami and Madoka set off for the latter's home, leaving Sayaka to go about the rest of her day.

There were too many questions, all piling up with the passing minutes. Homura was privy to Sayaka's thoughts…that meant that she was contracted by Kyubey, but then, wouldn't Kyubey have recruited Homura to his cause as well? Yesterday, everything looked as though Mami was fighting a one-woman battle. This was either a bizarre break in the rules, or Sayaka had been lied to by someone.

And for that matter, where was Kyubey? The high school had become a war zone, and he hadn't made so much as a guest appearance. Mami had to give an orientation on her own.

Something was definitely wrong. Sayaka felt it in her aching bones. And yet, the one consistent question remained ever present in the forefront of her thoughts: what was she supposed to wish for?

Sayaka didn't need to rest her body; she needed a peace of mind, if only for a brief moment.

Her feet carried her to the one place she could be at ease.

…

Kyoko Sakura took another bite of her red delicious apple as she sat perched on the bus stop bench, a bag of fresh fruit by her side. Her flowing magenta hair had been pulled into a loose ponytail. It was 'loose' in name only: she couldn't remember the last time she had bothered to get a haircut. After eating, fighting Witches, and struggling to find a roof over her head, keeping her hair in a presentable fashion didn't strike Kyoko as particularly important.

"You can't change that fact, Kyoko," Xulbey said as he sat beside her, watching the cars speeding into the night. "Yuma has been contracted to me for a while; her passing days are like a gift. Her life is all but forfeit at this point."

Kyoko bit into the apple and chewed it with a machine's applied force. "Idiot girl," she murmured. "I told her not to do it."

"Yuma only wanted to protect you. You're special to her in that way.

"I wish I could understand what that felt like," Xulbey added.

Yuma Chitose played on the bus stop sign a few feet from the two, swinging on the pole and waving her hands around happily. Her green hair swayed in the moonlight, its innocence second only to the way the ball clips in her hair shined like stars.

Kyoko tossed the apple core aside and took in a breath of cold night air. "I've gotta say, you've got a lot of nerve asking me about this," she said. "A _lot_ of nerve coming at me like this, Xulbey. Like, balls of titanium."

"I'm only trying to be fair," Xulbey feigned honesty. "When I contracted Yuma, I thought she knew what she was getting in for. We Incubators don't necessarily understand why you always feel so cheated when things don't go as you planned, but that's beside the point."

He turned to face the redheaded warrior, with no fearful bone in his small, fluffy stuffed-animal body. "I'm offering the chance to work with me to make sure nothing like what happened to Yuma can ever happen to anybody ever again. I would think you could get behind such a proposition."

"It depends," Kyoko said as she licked her front canines, "What's your plan?"

"It's not that simple. Every member of this effort has a specific job, and we must all play our parts."

"Sure, whatever. What's mine?"

"You'll like it," Xulbey said with a sort of appreciation for his own scheming. "You will have to incapacitate Kyubey the Incubator."

…

Kyosuke lay asleep in his bed, his chest rising in a consistent rhythm to match his gentle breathing. He had been sleeping hard like this all week, left utterly exhausted from the tests the doctors put him through, but he wouldn't dare back out of them if given the option. If he could get his hand to play music again, Kyosuke would push himself half to death. Of that, Sayaka was certain.

It was one of the many reasons he had become her sanctuary. Even when he couldn't talk to her, look at her, or even listen to her talk about the day's events—though that was arguably for the better—Kyosuke had become her panacea to the torments of another day. Sayaka sat in her usual chair by Kyosuke's bedside, resting her upper body on the mattress. Kyosuke was asleep; he wouldn't mind.

"Sayaka?"

Kyubey sat at the windowsill. Sayaka didn't bother asking how he found her or how he managed to come inside. Seeing two girls fighting fifty feet in the air will make you believe that anything is possible. In many cases, that was the name of the Puella Magi game.

"Kyubey, I have an idea for what I want to wish for."

He leapt from the windowsill and crept slowly around Kyosuke, resting beside Sayaka and brushing her hair with his tail. "Say the word! What is it that your heart desires?"

"I only have an idea," she said again. "If I asked you to heal Kyosuke's hand…could you do it?"

"Of course. There have been girls that asked for riches and life and death, you know. Asking for that is quite simple.

"But," Kyubey's became deathly serious, "I should warn you: a Puella Magi that makes a wish for someone other than herself always ends up buried alive by her own despair."

Sayaka was silent, letting the weight of the proposition wash over her like heavy rain.

"It's only natural," Kyubey's ambivalent monotone continued. "You're given the opportunity to have one miracle in exchange for a life of constant combat. We might be in a tight spot, but that doesn't change the gravity of your decisions. This is the moment where you must act for you, and only for you.

"Otherwise, you could easily wind up doing something you'll regret," he finished.


	5. How Do You Pronounce That?

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-How Do You Pronounce That?

Madoka Kaname's classes had been cancelled for the day, and likely into the foreseeable future, for obvious reasons. She didn't consider it to be much of a burden or a boon in any case. Some things suddenly seemed meaningless in the face of a greater cosmic purpose. She laughed to herself at the idea when she realized it sounded like she had found a new religion or joined a cult, but that was the state of affairs.

Her school had been destroyed, two aliens were at war for her, and magical girls were the pieces maneuvering the chess board of her destiny.

"I'm not your mother, so I'm not going to place you on house arrest or anything," Mami had smiled when she dropped Madoka outside her home the night before, "But if you're going out any time soon, be sure to give me a call." Mami struck her as a type of real-life angel: a force of benign energy. Even when she had beef with Homura, Mami still maintained an absolutely magnetic personality.

Madoka walked down the crowded city streets feeling envious.

She had never been good at anything as a child. Define 'child' anyway you want: being a toddler, being in middle school, being in college, being claimed as a legal dependent on her parents' tax returns, or anything in between. Madoka didn't play any instruments, didn't get amazing grades, only had a handful of friends, and popularity with boys—or lack thereof—didn't strike her as something that could be actively changed.

Mami had to have a ton of boys in love with her, Madoka imagined, along with her certainly-stellar grades. She probably plays some really obscure instrument, too, like the tuba or the bassoon or the contrabass. Mami seemed like the contrabass type.

Without even noticing, Madoka had wandered into the record shop just a few blocks from Hitomi's house. The last time the three of them—Madoka, Hitomi, and Sayaka—had hung out together must have been months ago, when they tried to pool their meager allowances together to buy the new ClariS album. They had just enough to buy the lead single when Sayaka decided she'd rather but lunch, and the whole plan had been shot down.

She hoped Sayaka was okay. Madoka remembered the look on her friend's face as she crashed through the door to the school rooftop: a solid determination, with zero possibility of anything getting in her way. Sayaka had always been a strong person, from the day they met into the very present, but that was just too much. Sayaka was the ideal best friend: she'd do anything for Madoka.

Madoka wondered to herself underneath a cauldron of self-doubt: what could she do to help Sayaka? If she ever had to help Sayaka or Mami…could she actually do anything?

It must have been a cruel joke.

Here she was, Madoka Kaname, the only girl on Earth capable of being the new ruler of reality if she chose so. She should be above human foibles like worry and self-loathing. Still, Madoka was Madoka, and rather than asking why that was possible, why she could virtually _break_ existence if she had the inclination, she asked: why would she ever want to?

Being herself might not be the most engaging, compelling job in the world, but it was hers. She'd rather be Madoka Kaname any day of the week rather than be some superpowered warrior girl.

Madoka absent-mindedly reached out for a demo pair of headphones on the wall, hoping to drown the malignant thoughts out with music.

"Kaname?"

Madoka's joints locked themselves and threw away the keys. She recognized the voice instantly.

The girl from yesterday.

It wasn't the green one that had done a number on Homura—thought that was arguably a mutual beatdown—but rather the second girl, the one who hadn't actually fought. That was much, much worse; Madoka instantly recalled the examining, penetrating stare as it burrowed deep through her core. The girl didn't fight not because of some kind of fear or pragmatism.

From the look in her idle glare, she didn't think it was necessary to even become involved. That kind of self-certainty was much, much worse.

Madoka wondered if it was too late to pray.

"My name is Alice," she said to Madoka's back. "I'm a Puella Magi, but you know that."

Alice walked forward, taking special care not to make any sudden moves. Madoka lowered her arms, giving up her immediate musical craving.

"I imagine you know everything by now," Alice continued, "About wishes and Soul Gems and how you're the all-important superweapon in this play. Am I right?"

Madoka nodded her head in a jerky, disjointed movement.

In a light, lofty motion, Alice parted her hair to the side to leave her line of sight unhindered. Her bright, baby blue eyes honed in on Madoka like a seeking missile.

"I'm not here to hurt you," Alice said. "Truth be told, I'm not even supposed to be here. This is just something for me; you're as safe now as you'd be with that Tomoe girl."

"T-then…what do you want from me?"

The corners of Alice's lips curled upward. "I just want to talk to you. That's all. I want to know you."

Madoka wished she were able to tell a liar from an honest person. Mami probably could.

Alice put a firm hand to her tony, toned stomach. "I'm hungry, Kaname. What do you want for lunch? I'm buying.

Madoka began to say every form of a refusal she knew—

"Of course, it's rude to say 'no,'" Alice pressed.

…

Sayaka walked home alone. What was supposed to be a quick visit to Kyosuke's room had turned into an accidental sleepover when the nurses didn't notice her inside with the lights off. That morning Sayaka had snuck out of the hospital, not making a peep, and set off for home. The cuts on her legs had begun to heal and she could at least walk as well as before, but her uniform had seen no change. On top of looking like it had been pulled from a burning building—which it technically had been—it probably smelled like unshowered teenage girl as well.

Sayaka stopped in her tracks not a block from the hospital.

The subtle pattering of a young girl's feet on the pavement was unmistakably familiar.

"What's that saying?" Sayaka mused aloud, "Fool me once, shame on me? Fool me twice…you won't get fooled again, or something?"

Turning around revealed to her one Homura Akemi.

Homura didn't offer an opinion one way of the other. She wore street clothing today, although you wouldn't notice it at a casual glance. The black skirt and denim jacket hung on her frame almost exactly like the Puella Magi uniform, which in turn fell on her just like the schoolgirl outfit.

"What, do you have your own personal dress code?" Sayaka joked. Homura wasn't laughing; from the cold calculation written in her cloudy disposition, it seemed unfathomable that Homura had ever laughed.

She wasted no time. "You haven't made the contract," Homura asked, "Have you?"

Sayaka stretched her arms wide, trying to wake her arms up after having slept on them all night. "Not yet," she yawned. "I know I need to hurry to help save the world and whatnot, but don't really know what to wish for. I kind of have an idea, but—"

"It's for Kyosuke," Homura interjected, "The boy in the hospital, isn't he? The one you're in love with."

Sayaka's chest felt a bullet train burst through it at Mach speed, ripping out her lungs, her heart, as well as her dignity in one fell swoop. A torrent of outrage swelled through her chest.

"How _dare_ you!" Sayaka shouted. "I don't know you, Akemi, so don't act like you know me. Besides, I'm not—"

"Your protests don't make the fact any less true, Sayaka. Admit it."

She doth protest too much, methinks. Sayaka had picked on enough love-struck girls in elementary school to know that golden, damnable rule.

A different question came to mind, suddenly burning in her imagination. "How did you know that?" Sayaka asked with baited breath. "Only my best friends know about Kyosuke, and there's no way Madoka told you. Is your power to, like, read minds or look into people's hearts?"

Sayaka hoped that wasn't true, but in an 'anything is possible' world, such things were possible.

"I have the power to warp time."

"Warp time," Sayaka repeated, not believing the idea as she said it. "What, you mean you can stop time?"

"I can turn time back and forth at will, actually. It's how I saved your life yesterday, as well as the lives of Madoka and that fool, Tomoe."

Sayaka remembered the fight with Chika, as well as their escape from the rooftop. Homura had moved _crazy_ fast, but there was nothing to show for it. No wind, no dust kicked up, and not even an Anime-esque afterimage. Isn't that supposed to happen when you move that fast?

It suddenly made sense. Homura hadn't moved at all: she had put the pause button on time in that fight and moved forward at her own pace. Teleporting must have been accomplished similarly: Homura simply warped them to a point further along in time. Sayaka couldn't argue: it was a neat trick.

"I haven't told anyone this," Homura said. "Kyubey doesn't know. Neither does his blond puppet."

Defending Mami came after knowing what was going on. Sayaka made a note to sock Homura in the kisser sooner, rather than later. "That makes no sense," she said. "How could Kyubey not know about your powers? He's the one that gave them to you."

An unsettling silence hung between them.

"That's a question for a different time," Homura replied with authority. "I'm telling you this now, and I'm taking a massive risk doing so, because I need you to stay out of this conflict. It's not your fight, and it never was."

"You're wrong. Mami said—"

"Mami Tomoe brought you into this because she was lied to."

Sayaka pictured Mami telling a lie blindly out of good intentions. She hadn't known Mami very long, but you didn't need to be around Mami for more than five minutes to know she was pleasantry incarnate. The suggestion that Mami had lied made her sick.

"What are you trying to tell me?" Sayaka asked, "Someone's lying to Kyubey and Mami?"

"Wrong. Kyubey is the liar. Him alone."

Sayaka's brow furrowed. She couldn't imagine Kyubey being a malevolent entity any more than she could see Mami lying. They weren't the first character traits to come to mind. "Come again?"

Homura took a deep breath, like a student before presenting a memorization assignmentto her class. "The Incubator known as Kyubey wants Madoka Kaname to contract with him to manipulate her power, just like Xulbey. He is no different; he doesn't want to help us at all."

It sounded like a crazed Internet rumor. "You're insane—"

"Kyubey pushed enough of Tomoe's naive buttons that she was convinced to draw you into this slaughter. When you contract with him, you'll do it to wish Kyosuke back to health."

She paused to let Sayaka have a rebuttal. It didn't come; Homura was too dead-serious to be making this up.

"Sayaka, what I am about to tell you will hurt, and you won't want to hear it, but it's the only way for us to save Madoka, so you'll listen closely. I don't repeat myself."

Sayaka was getting tired of hearing the 'listen up' demand. "Get on with it," Sayaka barked. "What's so bad that—"

"Kyosuke doesn't love you. Not now, not after the wish, and not ever."

…There were no words.

A void of black emptiness swelled in her chest, drawing Sayaka within in one fell swoop. Her stare went blank, her thoughts absent. How…She was spewing lies. Homura worked for Xulbey. That could be the only reason she's have been _trained _to say something so obviously _wrong_, so offensively _hurtful_.

Homura looked as though she had seen this all before.

"That feeling of helplessness is what destroys you," She pressed on. "Your death leaves me alone to protect Madoka. When I am all but dead, Madoka gives in and forms a contract. We all lose, Sayaka.

"It begins with you," she concluded.

It was too specific…too calculated. Sayaka had been described like a chess piece, like an emotionless number; she was being treated like someone's puppet. It was like a mundane psychology project from an emotionless figure.

Sayaka remembered the word Homura used: she was a puppet.

Kyubey's _puppet_.

It couldn't be real. Sayaka turned to her last defense: to question everything she could and pray for the best. "How…Homura, is this something you _think_ will happen, or…"

Homura's unrelenting, uncompromising stare was answer enough. This had most certainly come to pass. Being manipulated, her own death, Mami's being walked over, Madoka contracting and Homura's defeat weren't going to happen; they had already happened.

Kyosuke had already not loved her once before.

"Of course, there are quite a few discrepancies," Homura admitted reluctantly. "Xulbey and his Puella Magi are entirely new to this world. I don't know what he's getting at, to be perfectly honest. There's no precedent for it in any past or future I'm aware of."

A light appeared at the end of the tunnel. "Th-then maybe Kyubey is telling the truth this time!" Sayaka proposed more to herself than to the virtually deaf Homura, "There's something bigger than Madoka, and instead of hurting us, Kyubey's trying to—"

"There is _no force in the universe_ stronger than Madoka. That never changes. Kyubey being manipulative and evil never changes. All Incubators are demons, as far as I'm concerned.

"If anything, Kyubey's using the rogue Xulbey's presence as a means to speed up his plans," Homura suggested. It sounded more like a question than anything else she had ever said to Sayaka; further proof that her prediction of the future was absolute, hard fact. Sayaka was left with the empty shell of the hope she had moments before, that she could pull through this adventure and that her friends would be okay.

It only then occurred to her that this prophecy left out the ultimate fate of Mami Tomoe. She had a twisted hunch that the omission had been intentional.

Without anything to hold onto besides her own waning determination, Sayaka began to plead.

"Homura," she struggled to keep her voice from cracking, "What do you want from me?"

"Haven't you been listening? There's nothing you ca—"

"No. Just…just shut up, Homura!" She cried to the empty morning roads, "It's my turn to talk, and you're going to listen!"

Homura bit her lip, and then nodded.

"I get what you're saying. I do, really. Kyubey's going to get us all killed, and he's just as evil as this Xulbey," Sayaka realized that she was only taking Kyubey's word that this antagonist was the genuine villain in her life narrative, "But I'm not going to stand around and do nothing. I refuse.

"So Kyosuke doesn't—" Her voice finally broke, "So Kyosuke doesn't love me. I'll accept it and move on. That's what hearts are supposed to do, right? They heal.

"But this…I'm not backing down. Madoka needs me, and if what you said is true…then hell, you and Mami need me too. These Incubators are bigger than all of us."

Homura grew visibly enraged, shouting and lurching forward at a teary-eyed Sayaka. "How many times do I have to say it? You're only signing a death wish with your own idiot blood, and you're going to doom Madoka to her fate. Is that what you— "

"And you're somehow going to do any better by working on your own?" Sayaka shot back, "You're fighting two Incubators and any Puella Magi they can get their hands on. You need help. You might not _want _it, but you need it."

Sayaka wiped her tears on her sleeve before they fell to the cold pavement. "It's about Madoka, not us," she finished. "She's my best friend, and that makes her my responsibility, not yours, mysterious transfer student. I'll find another wish, and I'll become a Puella Magi and save Madoka. It's a promise."

Homura was out of ominous, foreboding phrases. There was no getting through to Sayaka: she was accepting certain death. Homura couldn't say anything more than that. The last time she had revealed the final awful truth of the Puella Magi, things only became worse; anything she said would only escalate a losing battle.

Sayaka was going to die, and yet, she was only really crying because of a boy.

Homura, against all instinct, felt genuinely sorry.

…

"I've got it, I've got it," Kyoko groaned as the train hustled along the tracks at a powerful pace. "Take out the Incubator so he can't make any more Puella Magi, then disable Mami's powers. Yeah, whatever."

"There's no 'yeah' about it, Kyoko!" Xulbey sat on Yuma's pre-pubescent lap across from Kyoko, letting the little girl stroke his sleek black coat as the train rattled and swerved along modern tracks. "And you have to take Yuma with you. Her healing powers are the only way you'll win this."

"Yep!" Yuma looked at her friend with a summertime smile. "There's some strong girls there, and you'll need my help. That's what I'm here for!"

Kyoko would never forget that, either. She was glad she wasn't keen on self-loathing, or else her life story might be entirely different.

"I'll have other helpers there for you, but Kyubey is your job. And don't forget," Xulbey added, "We need this done by—"

"Done by tonight, I remember," Kyoko said as she waved her hand around nonchalantly. "We need to do it in time for the Wappaginook or something in a few days. You said it so much, I'll hear it in my sleep."

"It's two days!" Yuma chided. "Kyoko! You said you were paying attention!"

"I was," Kyoko said, watching the city skyscrapers and morning sun pass by outside, "I just forgot a few details. How do you pronounce that again, Xulbey?"

"It's 'Walpurgisnacht'," he said.

…

Madoka sat in a simple coffee shop along the main downtown strip, a container of iced coffee with an ample amount of whipped cream before her and icy blood running in her veins. Alice had sat them in the far back on the café, out of the way from the windows or the misdirected glances of passerby.

The plate of donuts between them sat untouched. It wasn't so much of a treat as a warning; Madoka feared that Alice might grab her outstretched hand and do some evil act with it.

Alice smiled as she grabbed a sprinkled donut from the plate and bit into it. "Like I said before, you shouldn't be afraid of me. Not right now, at least."

The comment had the opposite effect. Madoka shrunk in her chair, hands folded and feet crossed. Why had she let herself get into this situation? Why didn't she just run and get Mami? Forget Mami; why didn't she just _run_? Why wasn't she running right now?

Alice sighed, more from being tired than from annoyance with the uncooperative Madoka. "Listen, Kaname," she said, "I just want to know more about you. What's school like, who your friends are…"

She flashed a conniving grin, "…What boys you like…"

"So you'll hurt them!" Madoka jumped to the only obvious resolution, "You're going to hurt everybody I care about, aren't you?"

"Hmm?" Alice prodded.

"You're going to harm everything I care about until I contract with Xulbey…" Madoka's voice shrunk back in her throat.

"Is that what Mami told you?"

Madoka gave no response.

"That's not it at all." Alice pursed her lips and eyed the ceiling before opening her mouth again, "Let me tell you the way Xulbey works. Maybe that'll make some sense.

"When we contract with him, Xulbey expects us to do what he says in the name of saving the world in the way he sees fit. We're all working for the same goal, but individually, we all play a small part. Chika's supposed to fight off Homura Akemi and Mami Tomoe, for instance.

"Although, we both saw how that worked," Alice smirked. Madoka smiled accidentally, and pulled it away in a nanosecond.

Alice waved her hand over the donuts. "Now, that's when you ask…"

Madoka watched the Alice pick out another sprinkled pastry. "I ask what your job is," she said, unsure.

"It's simple enough," Alice's cheer felt more misplaced than an Easter basket on Halloween, "I want to know you as a person before I have to do my part."

Madoka didn't ask; Alice wasn't bothered by it.

"My job is to kill you," Alice said. "Xulbey's assignment for me was to kill Madoka Kaname."

A/N: I feel like I could use some revision with Homura and Sayaka's scene. Any tips would be great!

Also, please review me. Reviews make baby kitties laugh.


	6. The Opposite Side of Your Coin

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-The Opposite Side of Your Coin

"Mami!"

The distress call flooded her mind like an emergency beacon.

"Mami! Help me!"

Sitting by the table in her one-bedroom apartment, Mami had woken up at a time of her choosing to do with the day as she wished. Without parents to steal her day from her with a barrage of unimportant chores, and now without the necessity of school to keep her under the guise of a normal teenage girl, Mami's day was her own. She had woken up, put on her favorite dress, which hugged her developing curves while maintaining a childhood innocence in its ruffled patterns, and debated what to do with the day. The first hour had been devoted to sitting at the table eating the cakes she always took such pride in baking; the rest would be decided later, whenever she felt like it.

Nothing of value had been lost.

With the world's worst timing, it was then that Kyubey's voice raced through her with an unmistakable urgency. Mami leapt to her feet, searching the room for a figure that wasn't there. The call was so loud, it could have gone to her ears, her mind, or even both.

"Kyubey!" She focused her thoughts, "Where are you? What's happened to Madoka—"

"It's not Madoka! It's me! I'm being attacked!"

The Incubator had to say no more: Mami put on her nearest pair of shoes and ran out the front door, not bothering to either lock it or bring a key. Her pristine legs carried her down the stairs to the ground floor as she tried to keep a tight concentration on Kyubey's voice. If she could hear it, then she could find him. In a city as bit as Mitakihara, though, she didn't have a chance of making it in time unless—

"Kyubey!" She thought aloud, fighting to maintain composure over the roar of midday traffic. "Run toward my apartment. It's the only way. Hurry!"

"But Mami, it's Chika!"

The image of green lights whipping in the sky flashed before Mami's mind's eye.

"I can take care of that," She said in a dry, bravado-less tone. "I'll come to you if you come to me. We'll meet up halfway. Go!"

"But Mami—"

"Go!" She urged once again.

"Roger that!" Kyubey said. Mami felt his worry and fear as she honed in on his presence: he had been running for a straight ten minutes, dodging something that was capable of destroying buildings and vehicles and road pavement…but that hadn't happened yet. If another explosion had broken out in town, the news would be all over that, right?

Meaning that if Chika and Mami were to go head-to-head, there _would_ be collateral damage. They couldn't fight in a wide-open city area like this. It would just be too dangerous. Mami tried to reassure herself that violence was not the only option as she ran down the crowded streets, brushing past tall salarymen and younger children and boys her own age, but knew that was a fallacy.

Of course, the obvious question—who should come out on top if it were to come to blows—went unasked. Mami preferred to leave such dire situations open-ended.

…

Madoka felt the world crash onto her shoulders with an uncompromising anxiety. Here she sat, drinking hot chocolate and eating donuts, with a girl who had been ordered to end her life. A life that, by the way, held the key to the destruction or reformation of reality as we know it.

For Madoka Kaname, it had been a rather eventful sixteen hours.

Alice's smile had been ripped from a deceitful alligator eyeing an unassuming and trusting bird of prey.

"It's not as dire as it sounds, though," Alice tried to alleviate the tension. "For one thing, I do still have a choice in the matter."

She probably should have led-in with that. "You have a choice in…" Madoka's throat locked up, "In killing me? I don't understand."

"What part?" Alice asked with a genuine concern.

"Xulbey wants me so he can destroy his own people, right? Kyubey's, too."

"They're the same species, so that's kind of redundant," Alice pointed out, "But you're on the right track. Do go on."

When Madoka didn't continue, Alice motioned her along. "Come on, Kaname. I'm trying to be nice here. Take the hint. We're going to solve this together, right here and now."

Madoka tried to piece together the answer to a riddle of a question she didn't fully understand. "I suppose the most obvious question is," she instantly chided herself for prefacing herself with doubt, "If Xulbey needs my powers to do it, then why would he have you kill me?

"Bingo! She can be taught!" Alice applauded with mock appreciation. When Madoka didn't reciprocate the joyous sentiment, Alice returned to her normal, subdued self. "That's the question I'm getting you to ask, Kaname. Why would Xulbey want me to kill you if he needs you?"

She put a lot of thought into the next answer, keeping her words slow and carefully chosen. "Because," Madoka said, "The Incubators don't really know what they want?"

"Wrong."

When Madoka looked on the verge of introverting again, Alice once again steered the debate. "Try this: perhaps there's something going on that we're not being told."

Madoka started to see the lines connecting the dots. "You mean...There's something Xulbey's not telling you?"

"Not just me. I'm telling you not to trust Kyubey. At all."

It seemed a little strict.

Alice stretched her arms, eyes closed and lips pulled taut. "See, Kaname, I'm not like normal Puella Magi. I have a power that keeps me on the sidelines of battle."

"Isn't that a good thing?"

"In a sense. I've got the time to find out what's really, really going on here. Especially since I have the power to make sure I don't get caught."

Madoka continued asking the questions, wholly unaware of her being strung along like Gretel to the Witch's House. "What's your power, Alice?" She sounded like a child in an adult's game.

Alice paused, debating with herself the severity of her decisions. There is a fine line between betrayal and personal interest.

"Well, Madoka Kaname" sang a particularly smug Alice, "I can't speak for my powers in-costume, but as it stands, I am capable of making memories vanish."

…

Kyubey collapsed by the water fountain, his lungs giving out under the stress of leaping to escape his pursuer. His paws burned something unholy; his chest expanded, but he enjoyed no fresh air. Movement was impossible.

What was happening to him? This hadn't ever happened before—

"Try not to get up," said Chika as she recovered from a particularly graceful three-point landing onto the brick ground of the public plaza. "The more you hurt yourself, the more fun you're taking away from me!"

Kyubey opened his thoughts to the girl, desperate. "Chika...that's your name, isn't it?"

"Shut up, you pathetic excuse for an alien!" She shouted as she approached the Incubator, her heels clicking loudly with each step. "I know what you do, and we're not taking it anymore."

"What could I possibly have done to you?" Kyubey asked with the most innocent of inflictions, "What I do for other girls is no different than what Xulbey wants. His goal is to eradicate all of our kind...what could you gain from this?"

Chika tried to force the thoughts from her mind and failed; responding to Xulbey's thoughts so regularly left her incapable of forcing out Incubators. "Hey, I just work here," she joked. "We're saving the world, and this is my part.

"Now then," she trailed off, revealing the green whip chord. It glowed in the daylight, morphing once again into the hammer form. Chika raised it high above her head, tensing her arms for the victorious descent—

A flash of light echoed through her eyelids—

"You've got to be kidding me," Chika groaned, lowering the weapon and opening her eyes. Just as she expected, Kyubey was safely moved. "I can't believe I fell for that. You were stalling for one of your grunts, huh?"

A golden Mami Tomoe, feathered cap on her head and glistening yellow skirt ravishing in motion, stood behind the frustrated Chika. Kyubey was nowhere in sight.

Chika sighed, rubbing her temple and pursing her thin lips. "You're that other one...Tomoe, right?"

"That's correct," Mami confirmed with a mechanic monotone.

Chika let the weapon rest lax in her hand, brushing her hair back with the other. "Hand the Incubator over, Tomoe," she said. "I don't know much about you, but you're no Homura Akemi."

"Is that so?"

"I know so," Chika smiled a confident warrior's grin. "For one thing, if you thought you could have killed me, you would have done it already. At least, Akemi would have."

"Homura Akemi isn't here," Mami shot back, "I am."

"Well, I'm definitely glad to meet you," Chika curtseyed, bending her knees back and bobbing as she fought back laughter. "I'm Aoki Chika, resident Puella Magi extraordinaire."

"Mami Tomoe. Charmed."

Mami held her ground, ready to summon an arsenal's worth of muskets and a department store's worth of indestructible ribbons at the drop of a hat. She trusted things wouldn't come to that for one reason only: bystanders.

A young couple (though much older than Mami herself) snuggled at a bench not ten feet away; an old man sat on the other side of the fountain throwing bread crumbs to the unthinking pigeons; a mother and her two young sons sat on the grass underneath the sparse trees, enjoying their sandwiches and watching the world go by. This said nothing of the passerby on the sidewalks and the streets filled with vehicles going to and fro with unrelenting efficiency.

Chika watched the wheel turn in Mami's head, the golden girl's eyes flashing to all of the people and calculating the odds of a tragedy breaking out. The verdant Puella Magi couldn't contain it anymore; her demonic threat of a laugh sent a cold wave up Mami's spine.

"You don't get it, do you?" She gripped the hammer once again, "You had to notice it by now: the school's a ruin, but did anybody actually look into it? Don't you think there would be _some _sort of news report about the cause of the wreck?"

Mami hadn't bother to notice, but after devoting a fraction of a second to the thought, it checked out. For a local middle school to have become a war zone warranted at least a questioning towards the faculty, which in turn would be all over the news.

There had been nothing of the sort.

"You see, Tomoe," Chika held the hammer back behind her, arm tensed and ready to strike, "My friend has a few neat tricks. One of them makes any muggles completely oblivious to us.

I mean, look around. Nobody's looking at us. Not even the pedophiles, and you _know_ there's got to be some in a city this big."

Mami's hope went up in smoke: without the possibility of a public outrage in the fight, she and Chika were free for anything.

Every bone and muscle in Mami's body locked, unwilling but ready for combat none the less.

"I'll ask you again: where's the Incubator?"

Mami eyed the hammer as Chika rose it upward—

"Have it your way, then."

The hammer dug into the ground with her mighty swing and resounding explosion of painful sound, spraying gravel and brick and mortar across the entire plaza.

…

Sayaka had only walked another block away from Homura, just to make sure her dramatic exit had been successful, before sitting on the polluted, likely-disease-ridden sidewalk and bursting into a waterfall of tears. Her eyes had become a fountain of sorrows and remorse for events that hadn't even come to pass.

She repeated the same question again and again, desperately hoping for an answer that could at least explain things. None came; she appeared destined to live in the dark, guessing the reason to the greatest disappointment and heartbreak of her young life.

Why wouldn't Kyosuke love her?

Did he _like_ her, even? Perhaps...just a little bit?

What had Sayaka done to make him not even like her? She had done everything right. They knew one another just before Kyosuke's accident, but as soon as he became hospitalized, she visited him almost every day. She brought him CDs of his favorite violinists; she brought him chocolates on Valentines Day; she had listened to his deepest anguish over the loss of his talent, and struggled with him each time to find the elusive silver lining.

What more did a boy want from her?

Or worse, did Kyosuke just not see her in that way? Sayaka couldn't help understand the possibilty: she had been there every day, talking about virtually everything. Girls are supposed to be mysterious and awe-inspiring or something, right? Of course Kyosuke wouldn't like her: she was just his friend.

...Was she just not attractive?

The more Sayaka tried to ignore the problem and focus on the larger, cosmic issue that had involved her, the less important it seemed. She had been willing to lose her normal life to restore Kyosuke's passion, and there would have barely been—

She corrected herself: there would have been _no_ appreciation.

What was the point of a wish now? There was nothing Sayaka desired, nothing she needed but couldn't afford. Her life was suddenly comfortable to a grotesque extent. There were girls out there that would kill and kill again for such an offer; why di dshe deserve such an opportunity?

And why did the ultimate fate of Madoka Kaname have to ride on it?

Sayaka dried her tears, at least into the foreseeable future. Things had to be taken care of, even if her heart wouldn't be able to help her in its shattered state. There were other people in the world that she could help aside from Kyosuke, even if it didn't feel like it.

Madoka needed her best friend's help, and if what Homura had suggested was true, then it wouldn't matter which Incubator Sayaka contracted with; Xulbey was planning some evil scheme or whatever that didn't really concern Earth at all, and Kyubey was preoccupied with stopping him. As far as either of them was concerned, Sayaka was just a card waiting to be drawn and played.

Standing by dint of sheer determination, Sayaka concentrated as hard as she could. She needed to find Kyubey—preferably Kyubey, at least—before anything else happened.

…

Mami's heart raced as she searched her mind for an answer, an escape from the conflict, but nothing came. Chika was in the perfect situation for a fight, and there was no way getting out of it.

In that case, Mami found herself grinning.

It's not like she would be at a disadvantage. She'd just have to actually try.

Chika leapt into the air, hammer first, readying her thin arms for a superhuman downward swing.

In the split-second opening, Mami waved her ruffle-sleeved arm all around her. Chika's carefully-executed jump had suddenly become an ill-planned freefall.

"What?" She cursed—

The ground had become littered with Mami-brand magical muskets, all loaded with one powerful shot, and all light as a feather in her hands. With a trained dancer's twirl, she took two weapons from the ground. She closed an eye to steady her aim—

Dual explosions erupted in the air, the first disorienting Chika, causing her to lose the grip on her hammer, and the second hitting home, throwing her head back and falling like a comet to the unsuspecting ground.

Mami wasn't done yet; without Chika's raw power or Homura's endurance, she'd have to deal as much damage now as possible. She extended an arm out to the rapidly-descending opposition—

Red ribbons flew from her sleeves, chasing the falling figure at Mach speed. They wrapped her like a child's Christmas present, wrapping her in a shining red plastic and keeping her suspended. The hammer had already landed, crashing through the taxpayers' carefully constructed fountain pavement with a magnificent blitz of rubble. Chika struggled to break free, but the ribbons could have been forged by Zeus himself.

With a mighty heave, Mami pulled the ribbons overhead, turning to drop them into the street. Like watching a train wreck in slow-motion, Mami savored the image of Chika being pulled through the air like a kite tied to a car, then slamming head-first into city asphalt.

Cars swerved out of the way, diving into other vehicles, into buildings and sending glass flying, into yellow fire hydrants to spray the streets with ice-cold water. A cloud of dust shrouded the scene in an overbearing black. Mami acted fast, spinning to retrieve more firearms at the defenseless—

The ribbon returned to Mami's sleeve with a sliced front end, as if it had been slashed through by a feral animal's teeth. Her eyes shot to the hammer that still lay in a crater; if Chika was defenseless, then how could—

"I like you, Tomoe," the joking voice came as the dust cleared. Pipes and puddles of water lay around Chika, staining her costume to the subtle green of forest greenery. "There's just something impressive about you."

The answer came quickly enough: the Soul Gem that had previously resided in the hilt of the hammer sat in Chika's firm grip.

"You accepted the rules of our little bout, and instead of acting like I _thought_ you would, and, like, being afraid of hurting people," Chika brushed the rubble from her shoulders and walked up from her personal hole in the street with an attractive, feminine stride. "Forget that. You tossed me into the street and shot at me. You're fun.

"You're no Akemi, but you're fun," she added.

The burning light in Chika's hand grew to a new form: extending to twice her height and at least half that in width, a magical sword appeared in her grasp. Her holding it with one limp hand looked to Mami like an optical illusion.

"Shall we continue?" She cracked her neck, twisting it slowly and intimidatingly.

Without waiting for an answer, Chika raced for the bright Puella Magi, sword behind her like a warrior's cape. Mami trained her muskets—

…

"It's better than that," Alice gloated like a socially awkward child on her birthday to the unwilling party guest Madoka. "I can pause the processes that go through our minds to create those memories in the first place. It's how Chika could fight that other girl the other day without causing absolute chaos."

"You made everyone in school ignore it until we left," Madoka mused. "Chika...that's the green girl's name, isn't it?

Alice nodded.

"What does she...I mean, what's her job in all of this?"

Alice put an arm behind her chair, motioning to Madoka with the free one. To an unknowing eye, she could have been rehearsing for an audition as a mafioso. "Xulbey won't tell us anybody else's roles," she said, "But the thing to understand about Chika is that she's psychotic."

"Isn't that kind of harsh—"

"No," Alice paused after shutting down a redeeming possibility, "Chika has a thirst to kill, and instead of killing Witches and saving lives, she kills other Puella Magi. She's done it before, which is why she was the first one of us Xulbey recruited to his cause."

"Funny," Madoka said out of the corner of her mouth, "I would have thought he'd recruit you first." She smiled a nervous smile, "You've got the best power, after all."

"That's different."

In other words, don't bring it up. Madoka didn't feel like forcing a conversation with the girl ordered to kill her.

"Don't think of me as an enemy, Kaname. I'm more of," Alice paused and waved her hand, searching for the right word, "I'm the opposite side of your coin."

"I don't—"

"I knew you wouldn't get it," Alice condescended. "You have the power to eradicate entire worlds, but you don't have it _yet_. You have friends in Akemi and that blue girl, right?"

Madoka nodded.

"On the other hand, I've got my own powers," Alice's voice doubled in seriousness. "Chika might not be the most ideal partner, but she's certainly an asset on the battlefield. Xulbey should be back by now with reinforcements."

She smirked, wearing an insincere smile. "It's kind of amusing. I suppose that's war for you, though."

"You forgot somebody."

Alice looked into Madoka's big, honest, pretty eyes. "You forgot about Mami," Madoka said. "She's the best person I know. She's better than me, anyway, and you forgot her.

"She has to count for something, right?"

An awkward silence made Madoka's pulse quicken. Alice scooted the seat back, straightening her outfit before standing up. Madoka followed suit.

"Kaname," Alice started, "It's been nice meeting you. I assume what I'm going to say ends the conversation."

"What?" The innocence in Madoka's voice could have created a land of milk and honey.

"Right now, I've been keeping this city unaware of a fight between Chika and Mami. You're right; Mami's the best of us. Or rather, she _wants_ to be the best of us. That will be her downfall."

The air left Madoka's lungs as if she had been thrown into space and left for dead.

"Reinforcements will meet Chika at the site of combat. Do you understand what I'm telling you, Kaname?"

"You...you can't—"

"Mami Tomoe will die, Kaname. There is nothing you can do about it."

A/N: Reviews are better than Christmas.


	7. How Sunshine Dies

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-How Sunshine Dies

Magical ammunition bounced off of Chika's sword like drops of rain as she cut through empty air, seeing Mami's bullets and blocking them with an impossible accuracy. Chika's rapid movements made the heels on her small feet act more like stilts than the painful crutches they should have been, adding more distance to her determined lunges.

She approached striking distance. Mami had run out of already-materialized muskets, and her ribbons wouldn't stand a chance—

The blade came down with a Armageddon magnitude, only to miss the target entirely. Mami dived backward, simultaneously creating another musket in midair as her feet swept over the fountain pavement. Her arm extended straight up, taking hold of the hilt while her eagle's eyes saw their opening—

It had to be perfect—

Mami whipped the musket right into Chika's chest as the girl struggled to bring the oversized weapon into another striking position. The trigger pulled back with a supernatural ease—

The searing explosion from the musket's business end didn't garner nearly the expected reaction: Chika stumbled back slightly, caught off-guard and sword grip thrown off-kilter, but far from hurt. Mami created more weapons in the air, grabbing them seconds after she created them, letting off high-powered rounds into Chika's chest without letting either of them stop for breath.

Chika didn't so much as grunt. The Soul Gem changed shape once again—

A green whip choked around Mami like a vice! The muskets around her fell to the ground with an unsatisfying clacking sound as she rose up, feet kicking and hands clawing at the spellbinding noose. She struggled to keep her thoughts above water, but she was virtually pinned—

"You know what my favorite phrase is, Tomoe?"

Mami choked at the air, her windpipe utterly crushed—

"Tit for tat. Can you say it with me, blondie?"

The whip lifted her higher up, leaving her for a brief respite before—

"Tit!"

Mami dived neck-first into solid pavement, her head craning back against the impact. It felt like being hit by a train, her every bone screaming as it was flattened by impenetrable stone. She rose up again, desperately clawing at the bind around her throat—

"For!"

Another nosedive into a different spot. White lights blinked in Mami's vision upon collision; a metallic red liquid spewed into her mouth like a hose. She flew up again, choking on her own blood, unable to see anything through her sheer physical misery—

"What's that last one?" Chika laughed to the ravaged Mami, holding hand to her ear and waiting for an improbable response. "Hum? Nothing? Let me remind you, Tomoe:."

Mami stopped struggling, trying to save her remaining, dwindling strength—

"It's 'tat'!"

…

"Sayaka!"

Kyubey leapt before the somber Sayaka, his legs still bruised from before, but his speed and grace back to their top form. Sayaka jumped up, still in the same place she had left Homura, but her eagerness to affect her own brand of change, fully re-energized. She brushed the final tears from her face with a sleeve and looked at the Incubator with a solid, immovable desire.

"I know what I want to wish for!" She announced.

"Great timing!" Kyubey huffed into her thoughts, his voice sore and hurried. "Mami's in danger!"

"It's that Chika girl again, isn't it? The green one?"

Kyubey nodded. Sayaka did the same, punching her other palm and cracking the knuckles. "If she put a hand on Mami, so help me, I'll bust her face."

"Sayaka, you can't rush in like that. We don't know how powerful you'll be as a new Puella Magi; you might only get in the way—"

"Do you want me to make a wish or not?" Sayaka barked, the deep sapphire of her eyes impossible to argue with. Kyubey's head bobbed disapprovingly, like a sorry parent to a disobedient child.

"That is the only way, of course," Kyubey resigned.

"Ask me already!" Sayaka bounced on her knees.

"Fair enough. What is so valuable that you would pay for it with your human existence, Sayaka Miki?"

Sayaka took in the deepest breath she could grab, closing her eyes and letting the sounds of the city rush over her teenage girl's face for a final time. She knew deep down that the wish was stupid, that the entire situation was ridiculous and out of her hands, but didn't care. This was her last decision as a human girl, and by God, she was going to own it.

"I wish for Kyosuke to be happy," she whispered.

Kyubey didn't hide his shock, straightening up and digging into her with the blood-red eyes, "Sayaka, did you forget what I said? If you don't wish for—"

"I'm not healing Kyosuke's _hand_ because his music isn't enough," Sayaka said. "He needs people who love him, people who would fight for him against all of the odds. Even if I can't give him my love, if I can give him this, then I can move on. You get it, right?

"This _is _for me, Kyubey," her voice rose slowly but surely, "I'm letting go and moving on with my life. I want Kyosuke to be happy so I can have a chance at it, too. Giving the boy I love a true second chance...that's my wish!"

A blue light began to shine in her chest, filling the two of them with a hopeful illumination, seeping Sayaka, finally, in a sense of _purpose—_

"Fulfill it, Incubator!"

…

The whip released a fallen and broken Mami Tomoe from its hold, letting her limp body fall on headfirst like putty onto a careless sidewalk. Rubble and debris still caught in her hair and blood staining her clothes and smile, the previously bright Puella Magi had been beaten to a shade of herself.

Chika's whip cracked to the ground beside her, watching Mami struggle to get up and mount some kind of desperate counterattack.

"You get me, Tomoe?" Chika laughed, victorious, as she walked a victory catwalk to her vanquished enemy. "You slam me into the ground a few times, I slam _you_ into the ground a few times.

"Just don't be mad that I'm stronger than you," she gloated.

Standing over Mami, hungry for a final strike but not allowed to deliver, Chika flipped the girl face-up. Mami's eyes were barely open, her chest barely heaving, her limbs and fingers not even bothering. The inspiring glint in her stare had vanished like the pavement.

The sword found itself pointed at Mami's chafed throat, cutting into the skin and pushing ever so slightly.

"Give me the Incubator, honey," Chika ordered with a scathing humor. "Don't make this your final resting place. It's not nearly blond enough for a sunny little girl like yourself."

Light faded from Mami like a candle in a storm. There was no point in carrying this on. Chika put both hands on the hilt and filled it with determination.

"I guess this is how sunshine dies, then!"

Mami braced for the warrior's unsung demise—

The deepest red, almost brown in color and like thick like molasses in its consistency, poured over her like a waterfall. Chika's blade faded, her Soul Gem released from her grasp. It fell against the ground and clattered like a girl's cheap decoration. Mami opened her eyes just enough—

A spear's ivory-white tip stuck out from Chika's midsection, skillfully unstained as it hung through the Puella Magi's organs. Her words came out as wads of blood, caught in her throat and trapped in her mouth.

"That's what happens to rogue Puella Magi," said Kyoko Sakura, standing gracefully on the untouched fountain's edge, spear extended and hair flowing with her red magical girl's dress. "They get punished."

The spear withdrew from Chika's chest, feeling like a weight had been lifted. She fought to turn as the hole in her chest filled with her fluids and her organs struggled to stay in place. Her knees gave way just as Chika managed enough strength to turn her head toward the Puella Magi she didn't recognize and would never meet.

Resting on that girl's shoulders with his stupefyingly smug grin and spiteful, studious, _devious_ green eyes was none other than Xulbey the Incubator.

"Wh...wh..." Chika asked her last question, "Why?"

Her lungs' terminal sigh released as Chika fell forward, lying lifelessly on the sidewalk of a disturbingly uncaring city.

…

Alice watched Madoka Kaname leave the cafe with a misleadingly stoic gait. She faded into the crowd of men and women, her iconic pigtails fading as she approached the train station. It was a bit of a loss to not get her own questions asked, but a fool could see that Madoka didn't have the answers. Rather, Madoka Kaname had _no_ answers.

Alice stood outside, hands in her pockets, a smug grin on her round face. Homura stood on the other side of the entrance, looking the same as usual: revealing nothing, ready for anything.

"How'd you know?" Alice didn't look at her. "Where we were, anyway."

"I've taken Madoka here before."

"No, you haven't," Alice said to the crowd, "At least, she didn't show it. I think she would have looked more comfortable."

"She knew what you were."

"Please," Alice sighed. "_You_ don't know what I am, and you know everything, Homura Akemi the Time Traveler."

Homura didn't have to ask; Alice turned to look at her like a scientist would a dissected pig. "You're wondering about me now, I imagine. You're asking, how does this other girl know my secret? How does she know that I've been going back in time to save the life of Madoka Kaname, the girl I'm _so in love_ with, if even I won't admit those words to myself?"

Homura's barrier of self-certainty fell silently, crumbling into a million jagged shards.

"Or better yet," Alice went on, "You're wondering why, if I know about you and Madoka and the past, why you don't?"

She had talked long enough. "Excuse me?" Homura asked cooly.

"You don't remember how your last cycle ended, do you?"

Silence.

"You don't remember what happened after you left to fight the Walpurgisnacht, right? You remember going alone, toward certain death, just to protect Madoka. There was something about a dead red-head chick and the blue one turning into a Witch or whatever, also. Then you woke up again, in your bed, in a world you didn't create.

"Feel free to stop me at any time," she added.

The time traveler finally had a question of her own. "If you know all of this, then what's your angle?"

"Say it with less obvious heroics, please."

"What do you want out of this?"

Alice twirled a strand of hair in her long fingers. "I want to know why I'm here. You see, Homura, I have my own problems. Like...

"Look at you: you know at least a hundred variants of this month. I know nothing of my entire life _except_ for Xulbey and this last month. Doesn't that strike you as odd?"

"And what, you think Madoka—"

"I thought she did," Alice sighed, "But she doesn't know anything. Madoka Kaname is worthless to me.

"At least, _this _Madoka is," she finished.

…

Kyoko towered over the fallen Chika, watching her cold body like a piece of abstract art, to be judged and finally forgotten. Mami struggled to keep her thoughts flowing, to keep herself conscious in spite of the overwhelming pain in every body part she could name. The sight of flowing red hair and brown, murky air polluted her vision like a curtain of wounds and weakness.

"This is it, right?" Kyoko asked Xulbey, who sat at her feet like the innocent pet animal he pretended to be. Her long, awe-inspiring lance pointed to the hilt of the late Chika's weapon.

"Take it," Xulbey ordered. When Kyoko hesitated, the Incubator added, "It's perfectly safe. She's dead, after all."

The words hit Mami like the recoil of forty of her muskets.

With an ambivalent shrug, Kyoko knelt down to the defeated corpse and pried the whip hilt from her fingers. Her eyebrows shot up in vague interest: the Soul Gem had disappeared entirely.

"Hey, Xulbey?" She asked, "You know how there was supposed to be a Soul Gem or something in here?"

"Yes?" 

"Well, there kind of...isn't one."

"I know," Xulbey turned over on his back to lick at his thighs. "Soul Gems disappear when Puella Magi die.

"Don't ask me how that happens," he quipped when Kyoko opened her mouth for more questions, "But it's not important anyway. What we're here for is still on the hilt."

Kyoko examined the weapon: where the emerald Soul Gem would have been located, in the dead center of the wielder's grip, instead sat the empty gold rim of an outline. The Gem's absence was more than noticeable: without the Gem in the center of the weapon, it seemed more like a broken child's playtoy, incomplete and ineffective.

"We need this, huh?" Kyoko put the hilt in her pocket. "Whatever you say. You're the mastermind here, not me."

"I would prefer you not to think of me as a mastermind, Kyoko," Xulbey said, sitting up and bobbing his head. "I'd like the term 'chess master', come to think of it. It's a lot less supervillain-y."

The crimson magical girl stifled a laugh in her throat.

"K-Kyoko?"

The voice was both distant and impossibly familiar to her ears.

"Kyoko, is that you?"

"It's me, Mams," Kyoko said, standing up and not making eye contact with the defeated Mami. Nonetheless, the grin that spread across the bright Puella Magi was ripped from a firework-scattered night. She tried talking, asking even one of the thousands of questions that had instantly leapt to mind; a shower of blood and hurt followed instead.

"Keep quiet, kid," Kyoko said. "I've got you covered."

"Yuma!" She called out across the blasted plaza. "Come on out. It's safe, and I need you."

Yuma Chitose, already in her magical girl uniform with light green cat ears fit for an infant princess, jumped out from her cover in the trees near the untouched water fountain. "Yuma here~!" She sang happily. "What do you need, sis?"

The sisterly affection drove the stake of guilt further through Kyoko's chest with each passing day. She fought to ignore it, keeping her mind on the task at hand. "That's Mami Tomoe," Kyoko pointed.

"Is she a friend?"

Kyoko felt Xulbey's eyes on her, his ears tracing her every next word.

"In a sense," Kyoko said. "She's in pretty bad shape. You mind doing your thing for me?"

"Nope!" Yuma smiled. "That's what I'm here for!" The little girl waddled to Mami, innocent in both action and intent—

A graceful force dived onto the pavement's remains, startling the inexperienced Yuma and jaded Kyoko—

"Get away from her, you bitch!" said a trimphant Sayaka Miki. Her girlish gait and sense of hesitation had been shed like the dead and used cocoon of a caterpillar; a determination held in her striking blue eyes just as her white gloved hands held tight to a long, steel cutlass. A white cape billowed out as Sayaka stood, unflinching, surveying the scene with a spellbinding confidence.

An ornate blue light shined from the Soul Gem around her neck.

Kyoko put her hand to her head. The loss of words was downright overwhelming.

"Come on, Mams," she groaned. "You already got your blond ass saved once. Do you really need..." She waved a loose hand in the blue magical girl's direction, "Whatever you'd call this?"

"I'm not saying it again!" Sayaka shouted, slicing the cutlass through the air. "If you've put a hand on Mami, I swear—"

"She hasn't," said Kyubey, slinking out from under Sayaka's cape with smooth, controlled steps. "If anything, _this_ Puella Magi has saved Mami's life. It seems I was mistaken."

'Mistaken'?

Sayaka remembered her talk with Homura; the odds that Kyubey was _ever_ mistaken about _anything_ were likely zero. The question concerning how much of this very conflict had been fabricated seemed more than tempting for Sayaka to debate, but for another time.

Yuma had frozen solid, caught in the potential crossfire between the two opposing girls. Kyoko looked at the horrified look on her small, round face.

"Look, Mams here got hurt by that crazy kook of a Puella Magi," Kyoko waved to the motionless and profusely-bleeding Chika Aoki. "I saved her, and now I'm healing her."

"Free of charge?" Sayaka's sarcasm shined through her words. "I doubt that."

"Oh? Then what would you have me do? I mean, I _could_ demand that you give me Kyubey first, but that's just not sisterly."

"_Excuse me_?"

"We're sisters!" Yuma sang, a nervous pitch inhibiting her natural exuberance. "All of us. Magical girls need to stick together, you know? We're all fighting for the same thing."

"That's why you're with Xulbey, right?" Sayaka taunted. "He's looking out for poor, victimized girls like you, right?"

"Who told you _that_ crock of shit?" Kyoko's words landed like bombs. "Xulbey's making sure there are no more magical girls ever again."

"What's the point of that?"

"The point _is_, so nobody ever has to sacrifice their lives the way we did. Although if you're still in the business of fighting for Mami's brand of justice or whatever she's doing, I suppose you haven't had to sacrifice a damn thing." The spite in Kyoko's words belonged to a woman much older and far more scorned than she.

Xulbey sat at Kyoko's feet, the lack of emotions in his stoic face utterly terrifying. Sayaka looked to the Incubator for a hint in some form or another, but only found a familiar shiver racing up her spine. Even as a magical girl warrior, Sayaka could still be scared.

She didn't like the feeling; not one bit.

"Tell me, blue bomber," Kyoko smirked, "what did your Incubator say about me? I'm kind of interested now, to be honest."

Sayaka was growing fed-up; it's one thing to help out a friend who might or might not be getting used for some alien cause, but sitting up and _debating_ it in the middle of a ransacked city landmark just felt ridiculous. She lowered the cutlass. "Hurry up and heal her, would you? This is getting dull," Sayaka said.

"We don't get a thanks? You know, for saving Mams' life and everything."

That time, Sayaka's ears picked up the interesting infliction on her friend's name.

Mams? Where'd that come from?

Yuma knelt beside Mami and placed her hands over the girls' heaving and shuddering chest. As the other magical girls watched, one with apathy and another with a nearly tangible distrust, Yuma's hands glowed a bright green to match her outfit. The lights engulfed Mami in their benevolent illumination, coating her in a warm sensation. Mami's breaths became regulated, then slower, to finally a normal rate; her wounds faded like the snow on a fresh spring day. Her outfit reverted to the subtle dress she had worn with pride not even an hour ago, and with a final burst of lime-green light, Mami Tomoe had been fully restored.

…

"See, Homura, there's a thing about your time warping deal that I don't think you realized yet," Alice said, her hair blowing against the high traffic winds like a piece of moving fine art. "I mean, you've either known it or realized it in every other time, but I feel like you didn't figure it out yet."

Homura was growing tired of the games, but wasn't about to start a fight, either. Beating information out of somebody generally led to a lot of bleeding and the information lost. It was better to stand her ground.

"You don't know what I'm talking about, eh, Akemi? Let me spell it out for you."

The steel emotion remained on Homura's face like a vice.

"Every time you warp us into a different timeline, you think you're going back to a base setting or whatever, right? Like, at the beginning of the month, Madoka will be Madoka, that blue girl will still have outrageously blue hair, and you'll still want to get in Madoka's pants, or whatever you want with her. I don't particularly care.

"But the funny thing is, the more times you make a new timeline, the more you're changing the base people you started with. I mean, look at you, for instance. Don't tell me you're still that adorable moe-blob with the glasses. I just wanted to box her up and take her home with me!"

"What are you getting at?" Homura strained, trying and failing to suppress the memory of herself as the one needing to be protected, or the weak girl unable to do anything for the one she loved.

"I'm saying that you need to think about what you've been doing to poor Madoka this whole time. After all, she is our savior."

"Then what are you supposed to be?" Homura jumped at the chance to retaliate. "Tell me that. You know things I don't know about myself. You're not a normal Puella Magi, are you? You're not working for Xulbey any more than I am."

A punishing silence between them, sandwiched between their conflicting emotions and the cold emotionlessness of the city denizens.

"Well, let's say that there is some fiction in your truth, and some truth in your fiction." Alice bounced off of the wall with a grin. "_The Animatrix_. Great shorts. You should watch them with your girlfriend sometime."

Alice left without another word. Homura felt an electric, instantaneous reaction to go after her, to find out what Alice was and how she could possibly know so much and make Homura know so _little—_

She resisted the pull. If her tabs on the key players were still accurate, then Mami was still busy and Sayaka was hopefully (but unlikely) unable to do anything. Madoka was unprotected.

That mattered more than any question in the world.

A/N: Man, reviews are wonderful. Am I right?


	8. You're Just Fibbing!

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-You're Just Fibbing!

The instant that she stepped off of the train, Madoka's thoughts had been silenced. An instinct shot through her, pulling her to the one place she could go to be at ease. It hadn't been a long time since she found herself at her own quiet place, especially with Hitomi busy and Sayaka having her own problems, but the last day had felt like a lifetime. Between Mami's and Alice's speeches, Madoka was between a rock and a hard place. Or to put it more accurately, between a rock and a magical girl war.

Her feet dragged her through the crowded city streets as though she were guided by a magnetic, irresistible desire to be at even the most temporary ease.

...And even alone with her thoughts, Madoka didn't feel anything more than the most fleeting of freedoms.

Madoka sat on the lawn overlooking the lake, watching the sun reflect on the strong teal waves and taking in the sounds of rushing water. The blue notebook sat in her lap, pen clutched in her hands, but for one reason or another, she was unable to put them together. Expressing herself seemed less important than it once did, for an array of obvious reasons. She and Sayaka had been here the day before the school had been destroyed: that morning, they simply walked together and joked about the unbearable dullness of their lives.

The irony hit her: that's what happens when you wish for a more interesting day, right?

The empty notebook mocked Madoka with its scathingly vapid, blank white lines.

She had debated turning the notebook into a diary, but what would she even write in it? 'Dear diary, today I found out that I've got the fate of the world riding on my shoulders as the most powerful Puella Magi. Mami says that if I make a wish, then I'm supposed to fight for the rest of my life until I die. If I don't make a wish, another group of Puella Magi will hurt people until they've made me use my wish for them. Just another day in the life. Homework blows.'

She laughed morbidly to herself. That sounded worse in her head than she had imagined; writing it down would be pure comedic material. But then, what else was she supposed to do? Just complain?

It got worse: there were girls out there fighting for her when she wouldn't do anything herself. Mami had been so kind to her, and Homura had fought that green magical girl at the school to protect her.

Protecting her…it seemed like the cruelest of jokes. What was there to protect in Madoka besides potential? She wasn't anything special, and that fact wasn't changing anytime soon. There wasn't anything she could do to change the situation, either. It's not like she could up and walk away from Puella Magi, from Incubators, or…

…Or, she could just suck it up and make her wish already—

The idea had already crossed her mind once before. The open pages of her notebook fluttered around the most recent depiction of her most recent fantasy: Magical Girl Madoka. The version of her on the written page wore a pink dress, with a stiff skirt surrounding her in a billowy fabric embrace. Matching magenta ribbons tied perfectly around her pigtails, and her bangs hanging in a picturesque manner.

More importantly, though, this Madoka was actually worth something. This Madoka could fight alongside Mami and Homura for whatever was happening, and after that, she could protect the ones she loved from Witches.

Better still, she could—and would—protect Mitakihara City from _all_ Witches. Wasn't that what having these magical powers was all about? All of this in-fighting between girls and Incubators was just…just _politics_.

The only person who could understand her was Sayaka, and sadly, she had more than one thing on her plate. Madoka noted the happy children playing along to the city sounds while older youths sat around her with sandwiches and books: midday on another average weekday. If anything, Sayaka would be spending the day with Kyosuke.

It would be rude to call the hospital and ask to speak with Sayaka, wouldn't it? It wasn't like she had much of another option, though; Sayaka didn't keep her cell phone on when she was with Kyosuke. She had found that out the first time after five left voice-messages and a lot of misplaced anger. Sayaka said to just call the hospital and ask for Kyosuke, but Madoka had never taken the offer seriously. What if Sayaka was finally making her move?

Come on, Madoka urged herself. Call her, or don't. It's not that hard.

Just make a decision already.

With a deep breath and stout nod, she reached into her backpack and removed the red flip-phone. Sayaka was the first number set to speed-dial, with the hospital's visitors desk as its only second. Sayaka's idea, of course, but Madoka figured having the hospital that close wasn't a bad idea.

The line rang on the other side. An older woman answered with a voice like a warm blanket. "Mitakihara Hospital, visitors' office."

"Um…hi," Madoka tried speaking as all of her language skills took an unscheduled holiday. "Kyosuke Kamijo's room, please?" That sounded formal enough.

There was a brief pause. Mouse clicks and keyboard tacks went by in rapid succession.

"That patient is currently undergoing test procedures. I'm sorry."

"I understand," Madoka hurried. Sayaka wasn't there, then, but that didn't make sense. Where else would she be?

It was as if a block had been placed in her mind. Madoka felt as though she was missing something crucial, something _important_.

"It looks like he's been scheduled to go home tomorrow morning, though."

Madoka forgot she was still on the phone; she clutched the cell with sweaty palms. "I'm sorry, could you repeat that?"

The woman let go a gentle chuckle. "His hand is fully healed. The doctors are looking at it for the rest of the day, but he'll be home this time tomorrow.

"You're her, aren't you?" The woman asked happily. "The girl that comes to see him. He keeps saying how much he wants to see you."

"Oh, that's not me!" Madoka waved her hand in the air, then instantly felt awkward and buried the hand in her lap. "That's my friend. I'll let her know the good news, though!"

"Mhm-mm! You do that!" The woman sang. "Have a nice day, hon."

"Thank you!" Madoka closed the phone and tossed it back in her bag. Kyosuke was getting out of the hospital; Sayaka would be utterly _ecstatic. _That's probably where she was: Sayaka was home figuring out how to welcome him back to the world! She was probably getting out her prettiest dress, baking him cakes, wondering what the best way to meet him would be, and hopefully getting ready to admit her true feelings. If Sayaka could even do just that, it would be nothing short of a miracle—

Madoka paused.

Healing Kyosuke's hand had been a _miracle_.

The possibility shot through Madoka's mind like a bullet train tohell.

Sayaka would never do that. Mami had told them both the rules, about how they were trading their entire lives away to fight evil creations until they dropped dead, about how they'd never have time to be normal girls with normal emotions, and how they'd probably die before getting to actually experience a lot of those feelings in the first place…

Wishing for a boy she loved to get better…Sayaka wouldn't do something that stupid.

…Would she?

…

Mami stood loose and dangerously unfocused, like a girl in a dream, unsure of her surroundings and what could be even construed as real. Sayaka couldn't recognize her mentor, her friend, her role model; This wasn't the Mami she thought she knew, point blank.

Mami twitched her lips, trying out a sound before giving it voice. Her entire body entire body, preparing for any unfortunate outcomes.

"...Kyoko," she started. "It's nice to see you again." It sounded as genuine as an April Fools' Day love confession.

Kyoko winked at the blond girl, her carnal smile ever present on a painted, confidant expression. "I knew you remembered me, Mams!" She boasted. "I didn't think we'd meet again like _this_, but you know. Things change, and people change, and whatnot."

"People change," Mami echoed.

Sayaka remained utterly devoid of motion, unsure of what to do, if anything. Mami had been knocked out of her Puella Magi garb: was she unable to use them until she got rest or something? Maybe her Soul Gem had become too tainted, like with what almost happened to Homura? Or was it something more sinister?

Yuma ran behind her red-headed surrogate sister, clutching the girl's leg and peeking out over her hips as though this were a particularly absurd game of hide-and-go-seek. Kyoko lowered the lance just across Yuma, keeping her from running out in any event.

This could have been a more welcoming way home, she mused.

"Why the long face, Mams?" Kyoko asked. "You look like you've just seen hell. What, did I miss something—"

"Why are you working for Xulbey, Kyoko?"

Kyoko let out a powerful groan. "Do I need to go over it again? We're Puella Magi, and so our lives were pretty much tossed away with the rest of this city's trash. Xulbey wants to make sure that never happens to any girls ever again. It's not like it did anybody any good in the long run."

Kyoko had been so focused on Yuma as she said the damning words that Mami's inner collapse went wholly unnoticed.

"You know as well as I do that you're just...you're just _fibbing!" _Mami spat, her eyes shut and voice projecting across the ignored battleground.

Sayaka felt a warm sensation in her spine; Mami was still Mami. Even when she seemed ready to explode in a fit of rage, she still had her innocent character. The blond magical girl struggled to continue past a quivering lip and shaking shoulders. "Being a Puella Magi isn't about the wish we make, Kyoko. It's about how we use that wish to help people. It's about paying back those that weren't as fortunate as us. It's to make sure that people who care about us..."

Her voice cracked like stain glass after a volley of sharp rocks.

Mami's small body began to convulse—

"Mams, don't you dare cry on me!" Kyoko demanded. "Honestly, I don't get why this is such a big deal. I've got my reasons for wanting to end this whole racket, and I'm guessing you have a few reasons for wanting to keep it going. Ten bucks says Kyubey said something pursuasive. Am I right? Mami Tomoe, always fighting the good fight.

"Unless, you know...you're doing this for another reason. You wouldn't be, would you, Goldie-Locks?"

Sayaka was through watching; butting in was her right as a friend. "You watch your mouth!" She shouted.

"Excuse me?" came Kyoko's cool reply.

"The Incubators are manipulating us; believe what you want. I don't give a damn about you, and you don't even know me, but if you know Mami, then you'd know she'd never do anything selfish, and I'm not going to stand here and let you—"

"No, _you _listen, you blue tramp!" Kyoko shot back, making Sayaka flinch against her every will. "Mami and I go way back. I guarantee you: I know her the best. Better than anybody else on this entire damn planet, and when I say that she probably agreed to help Kyubey for her own benefit, I know what I'm talking about."

Sayaka gripped the cutlass and prepared to make the crimson girl eat her words. "You take that back, or I'll—"

"I'll even prove it to you! Tell me," Kyoko's tone had somehow grown snide, "Do you know what Mami's wish was?

"To become a Puella Magi, do you know what she wished for?

"What she gave up her life to become...do you know what wish was so important to Mami Tomoe that she would pay for it with her soul?"

Mami looked straight at her feet, her lower lip bitten and locked.

No answer came to Sayaka; anything she tossed out would be pure guesswork.

"Of course you're quiet," Kyoko laughed. She turned around, Xulbey at her feet and Yuma behind her. "We're done here, right? Let's head home."

Without another word, the three supernatural figures had left the scene. Sayaka remained with a confused Mami.

With her own flash of light, Sayaka reverted back to her normal form, school uniform from the previous day still in desperate need of a wash. When Mami didn't give a reaction one way or the other...

"Mami?"

Silence. Sayaka put a hand on her shoulder, brushing the impeccable golden curls along the way.

"...Mami?"

"Why did you do it, Sayaka?"

It was the last question she expected to hear.

"You did it. You wished for something, and now you're just like me." It sounded a lot more like a funeral eulogy than the relieved sign of camaraderie Sayaka had expected. "Why did you do it, Sayaka?"

Mami searched Sayaka's deep ocean eyes as the girl searched for a decent answer. "I had to," Sayaka said. "Madoka needs—"

"I don't need your _help_."

Mami left, walking through an ominous and painfully uncomfortable break in Sayaka's pre-conceived notions.

…

Homura Akemi's apartment had gone from the innocent room of a teenage girl to the command center of a warrior crossing through time. Maps, diagrams, weapon outlines and detailed calendars littered the wall space as they floated softly as clouds against the walls. Using her magic, Homura had gotten holograms to float across her pale room, giving her a space to focus on the one thing that mattered most.

Homura stood in the middle of her fortress, looking at the information gathered and trying to make sense of it. The appearance of Alice and Xulbey, the attack on the school and Kyubey's move to make in the events all gravitated around one girl, and sleep be damned, Homura was going keep that girl safe.

But bravado aside, something didn't add up.

Kyubey lay on the white sofa, scratching himself with his small, furry paws. His smile was more damning than comforting, as usual.

"It's the Walpurgisnacht," he said. "That's what's different this time around, isn't it, Homura?"

She folded her arms, fondling the Soul Gem held in her hand and hoping for a sign. Sadly, she knew more than anybody that whenever you need a miracle, it's just that much more unlikely for your wish to be fulfilled.

Besides, when it came to wishes, everybody only got one.

"It's okay for you to admit it," Kyubey added, turning over on his stomach to sprawl his limbs out. "I'm a little perplexed by it, too. That particular Witch isn't supposed to be here for at least another two weeks. The timing is so off, it's almost funny."

"There's nothing funny about it," Homura said.

"No, I suppose not. This does kind of screw me over, too, you know."

"I find that hard to believe," Homura said honestly.

"No, really, Homura. Think about it. According to you, every time I've successfully gotten Madoka Kaname to contract with me has been the end result of a plot revolving around the Walpurgisnacht. I have to say, I was thinking about timing my own scheme around its arrival. Sadly, some other things have come to the forefront."

Homura didn't feel compelled to offer any pity or advice. As far as she was concerned, both Incubators could go to hell.

The obscurity of the situation felt like being dunked into a tank of ice water. Kyubey was completely right: in each timeline, the Walpurgisnacht had appeared at a time where there were no Puella Magi capable of defeating it. Madoka would contract or die, and Homura would press her metaphorical undo button. That was just the order of things.

If the Walpurgisnacht appeared tomorrow night, like it was apparently going to, then there would be no shortage of magical girl warriors ready to destroy it. The Witch's appearance would come and go like any other mild distraction in Homura's life.

It was just too easy.

"Xulbey's got to be behind this," Kyubey offered, his optimism coated thick with a layer of well-placed mistrust. "If he's the variable in this specific line of events, what else are we supposed to think?"

Homura had her own approach: let the Incubator think whatever he wants. Xulbey's problems aren't hers in any regard, and on top of that, she already knew perfectly well what the problem with this timeline was. If her intuition was correct, then Xulbey was far from the problem with this specific turn of events.

She was willing to bet her Puella Magi powers on the odds that Alice was the problem.

Alice, who somehow knew about the ending of the most recent timeline when she herself did not; Alice, who had the foresight to get inside Madoka's head long before Kyubey himself had even met the girl; Alice, who, in spite of everything, knew more about the situation than Homura herself.

Logically, that meant Alice was the only person on the planet who knew what was really going on.

"I don't know either," Homura lied.

"I'm not surprised." Kyubey leapt onto the floor and started for the exit. "If you knew more than I did, you would have thwarted me by now."

The Incubator stopped dead in its tracks, waiting for Homura's weapons to materialize.

"You aren't going to kill me for saying that?" He asked.

"There's no point," Homura said. "You'll just make another body. I don't give up easily, but I'm not an idiot."

"I know," Kyubey sighed. "It seems that there are ways that I can die, though."

Homura's attention perked to full span.

"My theory is, because Xulbey's magical girls are working on a different frequency of magic, they have different means of affecting reality.

"In layman's terms, I think that because these other girls were contracted by another Incubator, they can hurt me. Since I contracted you, you can't hurt me. Do you understand?"

It checked out. "You're saying that I could kill Xulbey if I wanted to."

"If you wanted to," Kyubey added as he started for the exit. "Although knowing you, I'm betting you're keeping him around for some counter-plot to save Madoka. Correct me if I'm wrong.

"But then again, we both know I'm not," he finished.

A/N: This was the last chapter I had started before the winter quarter began; updates are going to be a little more spread out from this point on. Thanks for reading, and if you review, then thanks a metric ton.


	9. I Don't Want You To Die

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-I Don't Want You To Die

"This completes phase one of my diabolical plan," Xulbey's triumphant laugh echoed through the girls' minds. The Incubator played with the hilt of Chika's whip like a cat would its stuffed toy, bouncing it on his paws as he lay flat on the deceased girl's carpet. "We're that much closer to creating a Magi-free, debt-free world, ladies."

Kyoko opened the refrigerator in the next room, only to find cans of soda and a few boxes of pizza. For the lair of a mastermind Incubator, the apartment seemed less majestic than Kyoko had somehow imagined it to be. She pulled one of the pizza boxes and sat it on the counter, not forgetting to offer herself a canned drink in the process. Yuma didn't like the stuff, regardless of the brand, so Kyoko didn't offer. She thanked the stars for the luck: the last thing Kyoko wanted was for complete strangers to see her being _nice_ to somebody. Who knows where that might lead?

"It's rude to take without asking first," Alice said flippantly as she sat on the floor, legs crossed and elbows resting on her knees. When Kyoko didn't seem to understand, the girl added, "That was Chika's. You didn't ask for her permission."

"Come on, Al, she's dead," Kyoko opened the box to find the only slice left that wasn't either molding or already bitten into. "It's not like she's gonna come back from hell and yell at me for eating her lunch."

"Take that back."

Alice's words landed like bombs over Eden.

Yuma froze; the command had flown through her like the ice winds of the Arctic. Kyoko let the words register before she responded with careful phrasing.

"Take what back, Alice? The truth?"

The deliberate grin that spread across Kyoko's face was unmistakable and unforgivable. Alice's hand raced for her Soul Gem, gripping it and ready to put it to use—

"Alice, don't you dare!" Xulbey's voice bounded into the girls' heads with a hurricane's force.

"She can't just say that—"

"She can't, but she's still a part of this mission, and we need her." There was no way Kyoko or Yuma were still privy to this conversation; Alice felt superior from that fact alone. "Remember what I first told you! We're here to kill Madoka Kaname, and we can't do that without Yuma Chitose. If you hurt Kyoko, this plan goes up in smoke."

The truth did little to ebb Alice's rage. The calculated, targeted jest in Kyoko's eyes shined bright like a lighthouse beacon. How could she...

Her thoughts were no longer in logical progression, instead coming in infuriated bursts. How could you laugh at the Puella Magi you were mindlessly brought to murder? How could you laugh at killing anything? How could you be so _juvenile_ about killing another living being?

Chika might have killed other magical girls, and there's no doubt that it made her feel superior to other girls as a result, but she never _laughed_ about it. She might have used the fact as banter, and she might have become comfortable knowing that she had killed her own kind, and she might have even _enjoyed_ it, but she never just _laughed _about it. Chika was definitely psychotic; Alice thought back to her meeting with Madoka and lauded her own word choice.

A word to describe Kyoko? A person who saw genuine humor in the death of a Puella Magi?

_Evil_.

"You look constipated or something," Kyoko let the moment pass, sitting on the kitchen countertop and eating the slice without any further thought. "What's the problem? Is there something I said wrong?"

"There's nothing like that of the sort," Xulbey interjected, his voice having dropped to a jarringly benign sound. "It's more that…the next phase of our operation means that you and your friend will need to be here for all of the next day, and I wanted to know how to break it to you."

"All day?" Yuma whined. "What are we supposed to do in here? I've gotta say, Xulz, I don't like that at all."

"Staying inside? But you'll have to. It simply won't be safe to go outside."

While Yuma nodded to herself, willing to take Xulbey's word at face value, Kyoko was unsatisfied. She waved her hand in the air and bobbed her head. "When you spout foreboding stuff like that, tt's hard to think you're not really going along and preparing a doomsday weapon or—"

"I'm going to become a Puella Magi and use my power tomorrow at noon."

Xulbey shot the confident Alice an unchanging but still meaningful stare. Alice ignored the Incubator entirely.

"Your power?" Kyoko bit into her slice with mockery dripping from each word. It concealed her genuine interest. "What could that be?"

"It's the endgame to this masquerade," Xulbey said. "Tomorrow night, the other Puella Magi in Mitakihara will be dead, along with Kyubey.

"I will be the victor," he finished.

…

Madoka suddenly hated herself.

How could she have been so stupid?

Moments after Alice told her that Mami was in danger, Madoka should have gone straight to Homura, or even tried to make a wish to fight herself. Instead, she went and wrote things in that damn notebook and sat by the lake like an idiot. She was worse than an idiot! A smart person doesn't hear that her friends are in danger and does nothing about it. What kind of friend is that?

And yet, that's exactly what ended up happening.

"It's not your fault," Sayaka said as she sat on her bed, legs crossed and hands playing with her small toes. "You said that this Alice kid plays with memories, right? She just made you forget."

How was that acceptable? Alice just 'made her forget' about Mami fighting to her near demise, Sayaka's becoming a Puella Magi, and another girl coming and outright _killing_ Kyoko in cold blood? It felt like she had missed an episode of a soap opera.

"That's no excuse!" Madoka said as she lay on the floor, arms sprawled and eyes staring into the ceiling's captivating nothingness. "You became a Puella Magi for Mami, and I didn't even know she was in danger." It was more or less the truth: Sayaka could have become a warrior at any time. The only reason she had done so right then was to save their companion.

Meanwhile, Madoka had been eating donuts and drawing stick figures.

"How am I supposed to face her again, Sayaka?" She threw her small hands over her face. "I'm a horrible person. Mami won't forgive me."

Sayaka couldn't help but notice the irony: in a city with aliens manipulating girls into stabbing one another, innocent and pigtailed Madoka Kaname was somehow the horrible person.

"Madoka, you're doing it again," she smiled.

"Doing what?"

"That thing you do, where you put yourself down and act like everybody else is so much better than you are," Sayaka looked at the sapphire ring on her finger as she spoke. "I'm just a person, too, so don't for a second think that I'm better than you, because I'm not. Nobody is. You don't have to stand up to anyone else's standards."

Nobody's standards but her own, Madoka finished the thought.

It was pretty. It was also a load of BS.

Madoka looked outside the window, trying to direct her attention to something else. It was a vain effort—how could anything be as important as being a Puella Magi?—but Madoka could no longer bear to focus on the current situation. Night had fallen over Mitakihara City, shrouding it in the purple shade of a sleeping urban wasteland. Somewhere out there, Xulbey and Alice were making their next move.

The 'their' seemed off.

"Sayaka?" Madoka started, unsure of what she wanted to say. "I...I don't think Xulbey's really a bad guy. I mean, he's not _the_ bad guy."

"You're kidding me, right?" Sayaka laughed sarcastically. "In case you forgot, he sent those Alice and Chika girls to basically blow up our school. Remember? It's why we're here instead of doing homework?"

"I know, but..." It was hard to put her previous conversation into words. The way Alice had talked about wanting to discover the plot behind the plot, or the way that Madoka had been talked down to...none of it felt as she had expected. If Madoka really was the gamebreaking chess piece in this game that Mami had said, then why was Alice sitting around and questioning the rules? Why didn't she take Madoka to Xulbey then and there?

"I just think that..." The rest of her words hung in her chest.

Sayaka didn't see the conflict on her friend's face; she watched the blue ring on her finger, remaining in awe of her very own transformation trinket. "What do you think?" Sayaka asked, somehow distant despite being in the middle of everything.

_I think Alice might be the bad person,_ Madoka wanted to say.

Against all of the chaos about to engulf the girls, Madoka wanted to create some sense of connection between them. She wanted to tell Sayaka how afraid she was for herself, for their new friend Mami, for the world in general; she wanted to say how afraid she was of what might become of her and her potential to affect the fabric of space-time. More than anything, she wanted to tell Sayaka how much she didn't like her having these new powers, and how she was now on the battlefield waiting to kill or be killed. She wanted to say she wanted the old Sayaka back. That wasn't even a mean thing: she wanted the powerless, normal Sayaka back.

But looking at the blue ring on Sayaka's finger changed the picture instantly. Sayaka was right: Madoka _was _an innocent. She was the only one here with no standing to complain. She wasn't fighting anything except her own self-confidence and doubts. What right did she have to complain to a Puella Magi about how much she hated her life? Shouldn't Sayaka herself hate life right now? Madoka had no right to complain. Absolutely none.

Madoka's jaw clamped shut, the lock shut and key tossed.

"I'm hungry," Sayaka jumped up, eyes still focused on her left ring finger. "I'm getting pizza. What do you want, pepperoni or pineapple?"

"I...you know I hate pepperoni—"

"I know! I'm just making sure you're still here, that's all." Sayaka grinned. "You've got to stay with me, Madoka! There's some weird stuff going on in this city, and we need to have each other's backs. Got me?"

Madoka nodded a melancholic nod.

…

Mami Tomoe waited at the train station, calves shivering and her breath warm against the air. She wore the dress from earlier and had simply added to it with a thin blue coat and a white scarf. In her human life, she was starting to take a liking to the mature look; going shopping for new clothing just seemed unimportant between fighting Witches, protecting Madoka, and pretending to be a junior high school student. Besides, for the occasion, she would look good anyway.

The night breeze did its best to chill her, sending Mami's heavy blond curls dancing with the edges of her dress. She stood on the balcony of the two-story train terminal, watching the cars go by and listening to the calming hustle and bustle of a city on the verge of sleep. She knew in the back of her mind that this was a waste of her energy, and that someone was undoubtedly about to be killed in a Witch's attack tonight. She should be out protecting lives.

There was only one Mami Tomoe, though. She hated to admit it, but that was the truth. Sometimes, a hero gets to take a personal day.

The lone footsteps came from up the staircase with a heavy, defined gait. The heavy breathing, nonchalant humming, and the ravenous crunching of a red delicious apple were something out of a memory of a memory. Mami had heard them so many times before, back when things weren't so bloody _serious._

The footsteps ceased. Kyoko Sakura stood in the dead center of the terminal, gazing at Mami as though she were an artistic masterpiece.

An impenetrable silence cast itself between them.

"So!" Kyoko tossed her apple core aside. "You knew I'd be here, eh, Mams?"

Mami remained as a statue, emotionless and unmoving. Her poker face was flawless. Kyoko strode to the girl, hands in her denim jacket pockets. Kyoko confidence didn't know the meaning of an off button.

When Mami didn't look her way, Kyoko tried to prompt her again. "Come on, hon. It's obvious you've been waiting for me. How long were you up here? It's freezing."

Still no response.

"And look at your outfit! You got all dolled up for me. You really shouldn't have." Kyoko hid a smile that said exactly otherwise. "You even wore the blue dress I like! You remembered I loved you in it...that's kinda sweet."

Mami didn't have the gall to look Kyoko in the eye—at least, not yet—but found the strength to open her mouth and use her words. She had to act as if this were any other day. "Don't get your hopes all worked up. You said you were going to be in town, and I just..."

"You thought we could have a night on the town? We could be 'Kyoko and Mami', like the good old days?" Kyoko flashed a devilish smile. "I can't say I didn't expect you to, but—"

"—I just wanted to see how you were. That's all," she snapped. Mami's calming, ever-soothing tone had vanished with the afternoon sun. Every sound emitted from her lips was cold, precise, and to the point.

"That's all," she repeated.

Kyoko laughed out loud.

"You're kidding, right?" She turned to her side, leaning on the balcony railing and staring straight at the unflinching Mami. "I know what this is. Your panties are all in a bunch because of the Xulbey thing, aren't they? Hm?"

Mami's hands clenched the railing as adrenaline coursed through her system. "You were lying to me," she said. "You're not doing this to protect other girls. That's not the Kyoko Sakura I know." Kyoko Sakura didn't care for other people. Mami didn't like to admit it, but that was the truth.

"Fine. I'm doing it for Yuma."

When Mami didn't ask for an explanation, Kyoko shrugged. "That's the one that healed you, anyway. The itsy-bitsy kid. She follows me around sometimes."

"She's important to you?" Mami tried to keep her voice uninterested, but deep down, she wanted to know everything.

Kyoko pursed her lips. "It's a bit complicated," she started. "Yuma's got nowhere to go, so she stuck around me. Have you ever tried telling a kid her age that being a magical girl _isn't_ all fun and games? Good luck."

Mami unclenched her fist and turned to Kyoko, slowly but surely warming up to her. "She made a contract?"

Kyoko nodded. "She made it to save my life after a really nasty Witch got me good," Kyoko said with a rare show of regret. "The little idiot. It's why she was able to heal you today: that's her power. You know, since her wish was for making somebody healthy, or whatnot?

"It doesn't matter," Kyoko lamented. "She's going to die at some point, and it's all because she thought I was cool.

"Hell, Mams. You know that I'm anything but that," Kyoko finished. It felt weird being vulnerable, if not entirely transparent with another person. She hadn't been this way in at least a year, and even then, had been with the same small, mature, optimistic and blond magical girl.

No longer able to resist the pull, Mami finally turned to face Kyoko. She felt like backing away instantly as the memories of their past days flooded back. The familiar electric wave blasted through her chest as she saw Kyoko's face, with her pointed and devious features still captivating and dangerous. It was everything Mami herself was not, and against her better wishes, it attracted her like the most powerful magnet.

Mami's and Kyoko's eyes met for a brief instant—Mami tore away before she could no longer keep her composure in check.

Kyoko felt a stinging remorse bite her in the throat.

"Don't worry," she said. "I didn't come here for _that._"

Mami was torn between approval and disappointment. "What do you mean, Kyoko?"

"I…" The crimson Puella Magi struggled for the words. "I'm not supposed to say anything, but I just…I couldn't let anything happen to you. I don't know about that blue tart from earlier, and there's some mess about a girl named Madoka that I don't really want to be involved in, but this is about you, so I'm letting you know now before anything happens tomorrow."

A red flag shot up between them.

It sounded a fire alarm in Mami's mind. She tried to remain calm, even if her heart was anything but. "What's supposed to happen tomorrow?" Mami hoped she had retained her warrior's composure in asking such a loaded question.

"They wouldn't tell me," Kyoko said. "That Alice girl is supposed to be using her powers at noon or so. Don't ask me what they are, because I didn't ask and I bet they wouldn't tell me," She huffed. "I just did my job. I did what I came for. I'm done."

Mami contemplated the wording: 'I did my job'. She looked into Kyoko's troubled eyes.

"Kyoko," Mami began to speak as a fighter, not as a friend. "What have you done?"

"My job was to eliminate you as a threat and destroy Kyubey's powers."

"Eliminate me?"

"Don't get excited," Kyoko laughed. "I might be a murderous bitch, but I'm not going to kill you. Xulbey probably knows about me by now, so there's no point in _not_ telling you."

Mami let her comments stay in her head; answers were coming slowly but surely.

"Listen up. Yuma contracted through Xulbey, okay? Now, a Puella Magi can't hurt their own Incubator, but they can apparently just outright devastate another one. So when Yuma healed you, the magical energy shot through you straight to Kyubey, and probably through the other girls he contracted. Meaning me," she added.

Mami felt the panic in the back of her head begin to multiply—

"Kyubey can't create any more Puella Magi from this point on. He's been immobilized; that's probably the right term. The deal was, I was supposed to kill you right here so you're no longer a threat, and then Xulbey would somehow release Yuma from her contract.

"He's got to think I'm an idiot," Kyoko smirked. "Even I know you can't undo a contract, because believe me, I've tried."

When the young warrior paused, Mami grew impatient. "Why are you telling me all of this? Why now?"

Kyoko put a hand to Mami's tiny shoulder. She paused to briefly play with the many golden locks, twirling them in her fingers slowly and savoring their twists and turns. "I missed you," Kyoko said. From the way it escaped her tiny lips, Mami bet it wasn't in the script.

Mami cracked a smile and yanked it away just as fast.

"What I mean is," Kyoko said, "Yuma and I are skipping town. Xulbey told us to stay put while Alice goes ballistic with her powers, but he's got to know by now that I didn't kill you when I was supposed to."

It made sense now.

It had been a plot from the beginning. Chika was sent to attack Kyubey, and Mami was going to inevitably protect him. When Chika was about to deliver a finishing strike—because like it or not, Mami could never take Chika in a straight fight—Kyoko would jump in, kill Chika, and heal Mami. Yuma did her job, then, by healing her and affecting Kyubey in the process.

However, after Mami was healed and off-guard, Kyoko was supposed to kill her outright.

But that meant…

"Chika didn't know about you, did she?" Mami asked, slightly afraid of the answer she had already discovered. "About this whole plan." It _did_ all hinge on her being killed.

Kyoko shrugged ambivalently. "From what Xulbey said? Eh, he told Chika that I'm here to kill some other broad. The poor kid got taken by surprise. I've got to say, I don't like how it went down, but that was the only way it would have worked.

"It's why I'm telling you all of this before I take Yuma and bolt," Kyoko said. Her words became sincere, lacking their familiar bite or disdain. Her other hand took Mami's, and the two looked one another straight and true. Mami struggled to look away from the molten red lava in the center of Kyoko's bright and challenging eyes, but couldn't bring herself to do so. "Xulbey is one cunning son of a bitch. He's got plans for everyone, and from what he said, Alice using her powers is the end of it."

"You're sure?"

"He said it was an 'endgame'," She smirked. "So yeah, that sounds about right." Mami couldn't argue with that logic.

"I didn't kill you, obviously, but tomorrow? Whatever happens, you have to promise me something."

Kyoko's words crashed against the helpless Mami like an orchestral procession. She wanted to hate Kyoko for their past, for running away from the law and from _her_, but every bone in her body said the exact opposite.

"Anything," Mami said.

"Don't use you powers tomorrow," Kyoko said. "No matter what happens. Don't go all bright and yellow, and don't bust out your guns. _Especially_ not that Tiro Finale thing."

Mami's eyes wondered why—

"I don't want you to die, Mams."

Mami and Kyoko stood there for what felt like forever, letting electric emotion charge back and forth between them. Mami processed the information easily enough—that she had to warn Kyubey and the other girls (including Homura) about their impending doom—but her brain had shut off. She was lost in feelings of a distant time.

Mami finally let her guard down completely, feeling weights break from her core and drop like craters. She asked one question.

"You're not leaving _now_...are you?"

Kyoko smiled.

"Well, there's Alice coming your way, and then something called a Walpurgisnacht that I didn't really understand, but...I guess I could spare one more night in town."

…

The unassuming citizens of Mitakihara City awoke to blood red skies.

Madoka had been unable to sleep. She had taken Sayaka's bed during their spontaneous sleepover at Ms. Miki's insistence (and Sayaka's chagrin), but she couldn't make use of it at all. She had watched the sky swivel and turn at various points in the night, with clouds moving back and forth. She felt like she was one of the confused clouds: always going back on her opinions, never certain of anything.

Madoka felt like there was now only one hard fact.

She had to become a Puella Magi.

That was the only way out, wasn't it?

She thought about it as academically as possible: Mami said this was a war for her and the chance to influence her.

Alice wanted to know what Xulbey was really getting at and staying on the sidelines.

The Kyubey Incubator she had never met apparently wanted her to contract and use her powers, but for reasons she couldn't start to guess.

In sum, Sayaka and Mami were fighting for Madoka's sake against Xulbey's forces. But then, if Madoka finally used her powers and basically spoke up for herself, wouldn't this all end?

Wouldn't she finally be worth something?

Wouldn't she have a reason to feel alive?

Madoka looked at the alarm clock at Sayaka's nightstand. Ten in the morning; hey, wasn't it time they woke up by now? She debated tossing a pillow at her friend's deep blue head when Sayaka's mother peeked her head in the bedroom. Ms. Miki had the same blue hair, but wore thin-rimmed glasses and had a fittingly nurturing, motherly figure. It was like looking at Sayaka twenty years in the future.

"Sayaka! Wake up!" Ms. Miki's lower voice called to an utterly knocked-out Sayaka. The young girl twisted and squirmed in her sleeping bag like a lazy worm. Madoka giggled with a taut smile.

"What is it?" Sayaka groaned. "It's too early..."

"You have a visitor!"

Who would visit Sayaka this early? It might be Mami with more bad news, or maybe Homura…but that wouldn't be right. Wouldn't they use that mind-link-thing first? But if it wasn't Puella Magi business…

Madoka instantly recalled what happened yesterday afternoon, when she called the hospital.

Miss Miki's words dropped from heaven onto Sayaka's tired ears—

"It's that Kamijo boy, dear. He's waiting for you downstairs. Hurry up and get dressed, will you?"

A/N: Thank you for reading this far. I'm very, very sorry for basically abandoning Cyclical Magica for something like the last ten weeks. It was a rough winter quarter class-wise, but rest assured, I'm back on schedule.

Also, the next few chapters are going to get a bit intense, both in terms of plot pacing and in terms of my actually writing them. I know I might not get many reviews after being gone for so long, but they'll be utterly crucial from this point forward! I've never written anything quite as dense as this, and I'll need some support.

And thanks again for reading, thanks x10 for reviewing.


	10. Enter Magia

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-Enter Magia

Sayaka moved with a motor attached to her legs. She didn't waste time asking stupid questions like why he would visit her when Homura had predicted—no, had outright _told her—_about the exact opposite. She didn't waste brain power wondering what to say or how to explain why Kyosuke was better, because if anything from the Anime shows about magical girls was right, it was that she could fully keep her identity a secret.

Instead of doing any of those things, Sayaka haphazardly ran a brush through her hair and another one through her teeth with one hand, while using the other one simultaneously to put on the first skirt she could find. Time was of the essence.

"Madoka!" she yelled from the bathroom across the hall. "Give me a top!"

Madoka rubbed her sleepless eyes and looked at Sayaka's daunting closet. It was as if a Forever 21 had set up shop in her room. "Um...which one are you—"

"The first one you grab! I don't care, just give it to me!"

Madoka closed her eyes and reached into the closet, pulling the first thing that felt vaguely like a top, and tossed it across the hallway. Sayaka caught it with superhuman accuracy; Madoka didn't know if it came from her new powers or from just being anxious.

In a span of thirty seconds, Sayaka Miki had gone from being utterly asleep to more awake than an atom bomb after impact. She moved down the stairs like a lightning strike, leaving

the bathroom in a state of havoc and Madoka alone and in a daze. Not that any of this mattered to Sayaka, however.

The only thing on her mind stood by the doorway as she descended the staircase.

He was something out of a forgotten dream. A memory of a memory rescued from the brink of oblivion.

Standing in the white button-down shirt and torn jeans that he had worn almost religiously, with his hair in his eyes and spiking out everywhere, not to mention his smile that could melt a girl's heart within nano-seconds, the unassuming and impossibly alluring Kyosuke Kamijo sent a heartwarming smile up to the blue-haired warrior.

Sayaka nearly lost her balance as she descended the last step, her hand unsure of whether or not to let go of the railing. If she let go, she might just fall flat on her face.; she might fall into his arms.

This had to be a dream. Here she was, looking straight out and into Kyosuke's eyes as though nothing had happened. After all of the fighting she had witnessed, after making a wish to ultimately become a magical soldier, after wearing a blue rock on her finger and after protecting Madoka Kaname, she stood here looking at Kyosuke—

—And the world gave nary a whisper.

"Hey," he said with a voice like smooth vanilla. "Are you busy right now?"

She was all kinds of busy, but for Kyosuke, how could she ever say no?

"Then let's get something to eat!" He smiled. "I'm starving."

Before her mother could do the motherly thing and offer him some food then and there, killing her window of long-waited-for opportunity—

"Take me anywhere," she said.

…

"We need to be honest with each other," Kyubey told Homura as she walked away from Madoka Kaname's sleepy neighborhood. The girl's bedroom had been empty all night, and her parents were appropriately worried. That wasn't good news in Homura's book, and to make things worse, a certain conniving Incubator was looking for the pigtailed prodigal child as well. "We're running out of time, and we can't keep playing this game," the Incubator said. "It's going to get us all killed, Homura."

If that wasn't the truth…

How could things change so much in the span of one afternoon? In the time it took Homura and Alice to have that brief meeting, Sayaka had doomed herself to being a magical girl, another Puella Magi had entered the picture and killed Chika, _and _Madoka herself was unaccounted for. This said nothing of Mami Tomoe and her company. They hadn't left her apartment all morning, but Homura knew when something wasn't her business at all.

But to top this all off? Here came Suspect Number One, the Incubator that screwed her over time and time again, trying to win Homura's favor when things became rough.

As if there were a shot in hell of that happening.

"You know how I feel about working with you," Homura spat. "You'd have better luck working with that Aoki Chika girl from before. You and I have nothing to say to each other." Her refined words cut with a sophisticated edge.

"I suppose I deserve that," Kyubey walked faster to keep up with Homura's pace, "But we _do_ have a common interest. The Walpurgisnacht is coming tonight, and I don't know how things will play out."

That was a first.

"I suppose you'll tell me that I'm suddenly the only one who can help you with that?" Homura savored the turn of power: what was normally her cosmic undoing was back to bite Kyubey in his alien behind. "Tough luck."

"Homura, wait, please! I need you!"

Kyubey stopped in his tracks—

"I know what Alice really is!"

Homura nearly stumbled over her own feet.

"That's impossible," she said. "You didn't even know about my powers—which _you_ gave me—until I told you so. You told me about the Walpurgis coming earlier than expected, and that was it. If you know something else—"

"Oh, I do!" Kyubey seemed happier than a child at Christmas. "Remember how I told you that Xulbey is a rogue Incubator?"

Homura nodded.

"Well, another Incubator named Jubey gave me some details on what's going on. He told me one sentence that will kind of change the entire name of this game we're playing. Believe me, I didn't want to believe it at first, but it's the only way to explain what's been going on."

A truth so catastrophic that not even Kyubey would want to embrace it? This whetted Homura's pallet even more; Kyubey always held the cards in their battle over Madoka. If something had scared him so deeply that he was willing to cooperate with Homura...it made sense, but it wasn't good by any means.

"What makes this other Incubator so reliable?" Homura inquired in a perfect monotone. "Incubators have been wrong before."

"Not this time, Homura. Jubey's the one that told me, but all of the other Incubators in this part of Japan have noticed it, too. We think we have an answer.

"And you know you want to hear it," Kyubey smiled.

Homura faced her antagonist with open ears. Kyubey seemed to be taking a deep breath before repeating the news.

"You don't remember the last timeline because you didn't create this one. Alice has created this new timeline from her own powers."

Homura didn't understand.

"Look at it this way: each time we've been at odds, you've recreated the month consistently. That means that you've been in charge of changing or altering things. But you didn't: each time, everyone went back to normal. Some things might have been outside of your direct control, but you never added anything to the world directly. Free will played a part each and every time."

It wasn't as though Kyubey were making things up: Homura remembered the Oriko incident with less than rosy memories. She had reversed time to its base state at the start of the month, but Oriko and her sister showed up of their own accord. Theoretically they still existed.

Kyubey continued. "If this universe is Alice's creation, we have no reason to believe that she did not change certain constants upon doing so."

Homura recalled her conversation with Alice from the day before. "That sounds about right," she said. "When Alice and I spoke earlier, she—"

"What did she tell you?"

Homura waited for Kyubey to calm down before pressing on. This was her first chance to be an equal in their situation, and she was going to milk it. "Like I was saying," she continued, "Alice said that she doesn't remember any timeline before these immediate events, like how I don't remember the last one. If what you're saying is true..."

"...Then Alice knows no other timeline because she _did not exist_ before she willed this one, and thus herself, into existence." Kyubey's words resounded in both of their minds with resolute dread. "She changed some constants, alright.

"The constant she changed was herself."

The question hung in the air. Neither of them had the strength—the _gall—_to ask it.

What kind of being was Alice that she could simply will herself into existence? What _normal_ girl—or Puella Magi—had that kind of innate magic, and how had she been contracted? Was this Xulbey's doing?

And if this got worse, only one girl had any kind of potential to match something that ridiculous.

Homura felt more questions open up than answers. Why had Alice continued working with Xulbey if she possessed such power? _Where_ did it all come from? And if she indeed had such harnessed magical might, then why was she so interested in...

Kyubey and Homura, against every bone in both of their bodies, saw eye to eye.

They had to find Madoka—now.

…

Mami put another plate of cakes on her coffee table and watched happily as Kyoko and Yuma devoured them one after another. Yuma had come over during the searing Mitakihara sunrise this morning, after struggling to find a way out from Xulbey's apartment. She eventually realized the easy answer: Yuma said she was going out to find Kyoko. She felt silly for not having thought of it earlier. In Yuma's defense, she was still a little girl; that she could find Kyoko at all with the girls' useless instructions was an impressive feat. Mami liked her already.

Not that Kyoko minded. It gave her and Mami some time to themselves.

Still, they were now running on borrowed time. Kyoko saw the conflict in Mami's large, glistening eyes as she sat beside them.

Kyoko swallowed a cupcake whole before opening her mouth to talk again. "You can tell your friends what I told you before," Kyoko said. "Actually, you really need to." She didn't want to use the A-Word around Yuma given its critical importance to the next twenty-four hours, and she didn't have to. Mami understood the situation, but didn't have any luck. She had all of the Alice information she needed, and nowhere to channel it.

"Kyubey's not close enough for me to tell him right now," Mami said.

Kyoko shrugged. "It's probably for the best, I suppose. Xulbey's not in range to talk to Yuma right now, right?"

"Yep~!" Yuma sang. "Thanks again for the treats, Mami. These are great!"

"You're very welcome," Mami said with a smile. While she wouldn't normally advocate wasting time like this when she could be mounting a counter-attack, Mami was taking time to smell the roses.

It was a curious situation for the teenage fighter. As she watched Kyoko and the unsuspecting Yuma Chitose eat her baked snacks with a speed befitting a pair of hungry Vikings, Mami realized just how much of her time was spent fighting Witches. If she thought back far enough, the last time she could remember being around human friends was when she was with Sayaka Miki—

An instantaneous wave of embarrassment flushed Mami's cheeks a crimson red. Instead of showing just how _grateful_ she was that Sayaka had finally made a contract and had used her newfound Puella Magi powers to come to her aid, Mami spat in her face. She started to worry: how did Sayaka react? What if Mami's moment of weakness—that had _nothing_ to do with Sayaka—had cost her a valuable ally?

But therein lay the rub of the current situation! Mami hadn't seen Kyoko in so long that she had all but written the girl out of her heart entirely, and yet, as soon as the red-headed troublemaker showed up, Mami knew exactly where to meet her. The train station had been their meeting place ever since they first met. They hadn't even met to fight Witches together, even if that's what happened eventually. No, they became friends simply because they were both Puella Magi and, even if Kyoko didn't want to admit it to Mami or to herself, because they were lonely.

Kyoko was back. Talk about terrible timing. Under any other circumstances, Mami wouldn't think twice about dropping her Puella Magi post—it's not like Homura wouldn't appreciate the extra grief seeds—and running off with her old friend. They might have had differences in the past, they might have bickered and fought and torn at one another, but that was a different place. That was a different Mami Tomoe and a forgotten Kyoko Sakura.

…But this happened now, when Mami was called upon to fight for what could amount to the fate of the world—

"Mams? You okay?"

The long-absent voice brought Mami back out from her head.

"I'm fine," Mami nodded with a trademark smile.

"Nuh-huh," Yuma grinned. "You look like someone died."

Kyoko shot her a chiding look. Mami bit her lip before indulging herself—

"Kyoko?"

Mami had the floor.

"Do you remember why I made a contract?"

Kyoko nodded, her ponytail bobbing along in time. "Of course I do. Your parents…well, you know. And you were gonna bite the big one, so Kyubey gave you this 'grand second chance,'" Kyoko emphasized the words Mami had used herself. "How could I forget? Talk about delusions of grandeur."

"At what point can I—" Mami started again, "When do I get to say that I did my job?"

A chunk of cherry cupcake went down Kyoko's throat sideways. "Come again?" She choked out, pounding on her chest to help the treat down.

Mami's words were certain—

"When you left, it was because I said I needed to stay here and help people. But…

"But there's always going to be Witches, in every city all over the world. And there's always going to be Puella Magi to fight them, too. That doesn't give me an excuse to be lazy, and I've fought really hard to make sure people get to live happy lives without being afraid of walking down dark alleys.

"I just think…"

She had to commit—

"I think I've done enough!" Mami nodded as she brought her doubts into reality. "I think I've earned the right to do things for me. I've saved so many people, and I've just done so much _good_ that I forgot what it was like to be around friends.

"And I let you leave when you didn't understand me, but I don't think I understood myself very well either. All I know is that I'm good with a musket, but that's no way to live your life. I might not have a very long life to lead if I keep doing what I'm doing, too."

Although Yuma continued putting the sugar-blasted lunch away like it was going out of style, Kyoko stopped dead. "What are you…?"

"If you're leaving Mitakihara City, I want to come with you," Mami said.

…

Kyosuke and Sayaka used to come here all the time. Back when Kyosuke was still working issues out with his father—Kyosuke was _supposed_ to become an engineer—he would come to Mitakihara Gardens to simply vent his frustrations. It wasn't anything as majestic as the name implied; Mitakihara's central mall simply sounded better as a 'garden' with its verdant color scheme and flowers planted all along the outdoor walkways and along the store walls. Kyosuke imagined it soothed a lot of people, to come out of a store in a mall having spent far more money than they could afford, and instantly walk into a virtual flowery plane.

Even as a boy in grade school, he realized that he had found the one place where he was allowed to simply _be_. At home, he couldn't be allowed to play his violin unless his father were in an especially good mood; after some prodding, Kyosuke's mother signed the waver to allow him to play here instead.

Four years later, a blindfolded Sayaka could still find the bench where she first sat and listened to his music.

Kyosuke and Sayaka sat together, ice cream cones in hand, watching people young and old pass by without a care in the world. It felt so perfectly _natural_ to Sayaka that it was almost dreamlike. She wasn't a Puella Magi anymore, and he was no longer a violinist; they were two people sharing a special treat in a special place.

And it was marvelous.

Try as Sayaka did, she couldn't manage to keep her eyes off of Kyosuke. Even as he spoke about the mysterious tests that doctors couldn't explain, or how the intense pain and numbness in his fingers had disappeared overnight, Kyosuke himself was far more alluring than his words. Sayaka hadn't seen him this animated in so long…it felt like being released from an emotional prison. His gray hair flopped this way and that with his every motion, and the sun bounced off of his flawless smile with each passing second.

This wasn't supposed to happen. Homura said this wasn't supposed to happen. It couldn't just be a semantic loophole—wishing for Kyosuke to be _happy_ versus having his _hand healed_—was it? She had a hunch that intergalactic aliens were smarter than that. Or perhaps for the Puella Magi contract to be so airtight, it necessitated semantic loopholes? She didn't waste another second thinking about it.

"…Hello?"

His words finally reached Sayaka's ears.

"Hell-o! Earth to Sayaka!" He laughed, knocking her head lightly with a balled fist. When she rubbed the spot, he tilted his head and watched Sayaka's subtle motions.

"I'm awake, I'm awake!" Sayaka said. She wished she weren't so _groggy_. "It was just a late night…"

"No, don't worry! I get it. You and Madoka, right? She's that shy one with hair like this." Kyosuke stuck his hands out from his ears and fanned his fingers out to simulate Madoka's hairstyle. With the ridiculously happy smile on his face, it _did_ resemble Madoka. A pre-Xulbey Madoka, but that was beside the point. Sayaka couldn't help but laugh.

Kyosuke took a lick of his ice cream. "Although…what happened to your other friend? The one with the green hair? I thought you guys were like, I don't know, inseparable or something."

A pang of guilt flashed through Sayaka. She hadn't seen her friend Hitomi in what felt like forever. In reality, it hadn't been too long at all: she had only started cram school at the beginning of the month. After the girls' midterms ended in a few weeks, Hitomi could join up with her and Madoka again. Their trinity could be back to normal.

Of course, that was far from the truth. Hitomi had missed so much that she might as well have been locked out of the girls' lives: Sayaka was a magical girl warrior, and Madoka was a living chess piece. Even if Hitomi walked in today ready to have fun again, what would they talk about?

Sayaka's mind jumped back from Hitomi and straight into the matter at hand.

It was Kyosuke. He was _here_. How could she bear to think of anything else?

"Stop looking like that!" He laughed. "It's like I'm out with a circus clown."

"Hey! What did you call me?"

"You heard what I said! A circus clown with blue hair!"

Sayaka jabbed him lightly on the shoulder; Kyosuke rubbed the wound and smiled back.

…

"It's time."

Overlooking the doomed Mitakihara skyline from the now overly-familiar apartment, Xulbey and Alice wore expressions of confidence. Xulbey sat straight up with his tail flicking behind him, green eyes unmoving and focused; Alice played with the soul gem on her wrist bracelet.

She thought of how much time she had spent in this place, fighting the different Puella Magi and working with the same Incubator day after day. She thought of Madoka Kaname, the girl who simultaneously was the most useless member of this cast and the only one to pose a threat. She thought of how much she had worked and schemed to get to this point, and finally, to be ready—

"You're sure?" Alice asked. "You kept bringing up Yuma Chitose—"

"Yuma Chitose isn't nearly as important as I told you," Xulbey said calmly. "She and I share a mind-link, just as I do with you. I'm simply keeping tabs on her.

"After all, she will always be with Kyoko Sakura, and as it stands, she's done exactly what I expected her to do." Xulbey turned his head to Alice, looking up and into her like an eager scholar. "How did you know that she would leave? I'll admit, bringing her into this was a smart play, but I had no idea how to remove her."

"It had to be done," Alice said. "She would have joined with Kyubey's girls if it weren't for Mami Tomoe."

"Right, right. Poor Tomoe…she really cares for that Kyoko girl, doesn't she?"

"Her memories told me so," Alice said.

Xulbey tilted his head as Alice continued to speak as an unfazed, calculated killer. "You read her memories?" He asked. "Back at the school…that's when you did it, wasn't it? That's when you looked into Tomoe's memories and discovered Kyoko."

"You're giving me too much credit," Alice resigned. "I didn't know about that Yuma girl. This all played out way too well. It's a bit too good to be true."

Xulbey leapt from the table. "I'm getting that feeling too," he said, watching the noon sun cast a shade of optimistic golden glitter over the city's steel towers. "It's why we have to do this now."

Alice took a deep breath. Once, twice, three times.

"That's pretty much it," she said slowly. "Then without further ado? Let's wrap this up."

Her hand gripped the soul gem, her fingers feeling the smooth and featureless surface of the purple decoration. In one swift move, Alice ripped the gem off from its chain, letting the rest of the bracelet fall to the floor and be forgotten as a chunk of metal.

She thrust the gem forward, presenting it to Mitakihara City and announcing her presence to this world that can't be saved—

'A bright flash' didn't begin to describe the transformation. Unlike the other Puella Magi, with their instantaneous transformations that could let them fight opposition at the drop of a hat, Alice's change began with a clap of thunder. Her clothing seemed to grow with the purple light as it flew from her hand, morphing her casual clothing into an ornate purple ball gown falling to her feet. It left no detail unchecked: her hands became covered in white gloves; her midsection was complimented by a corset accentuating her body in all the appropriate places; her sneakers turned dark violet with black socks. The soul gem reappeared in a hair pin, as expected, to hold her magnificent curling hair in place as it fell across her shoulders.

Alice was no mere Puella Magi—no mere magical girl—whose powers defined her abilities.

As Xulbey watched the show end, he felt as thought he was in the presence of a uniquely magical, superbly divine princess.

"It's…marvelous," Xulbey said in awe.

"I knew it would be." Alice's voice became more casual than before. With just that phrase, Xulbey detected a hint of comfort in herself. "It's not like I'd be anything less."

The Incubator searched himself for a response. "I suppose not," he said.

"Let's get this show on the road then, you cheap sack of fur," Alice laughed. She couldn't have missed Xulbey flinching if she had tried; if any creature on Earth could see her and not feel even the tiniest bit on unease, it would have more issues than she could count. Xulbey could more than see her power before him: he could _feel_ the supernatural might as it radiated from Alice's every inch of being. As she twirled slowly to let her intricate gown swirl, Alice's motions were poetry in motion, with each simply twitch lending itself to another in a poem.

If Xulbey lost control of her now, he could never get it back.

"We can't jump the gun, Alice," Xulbey said with a shaky commander's tone. "Stick to the plan. What about Mado—"

"My sister is taking care of that."

"Your sister?" Xulbey said slowly, as though he were testing the words. His tail moved with the sounds. "I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Of course you don't."

Xulbey became silent.

"You said this was the endgame, right? Well let's end this, then."

As Xulbey watched with a suddenly powerless sensation, the empowered Alice lifted a hand above her head and toward an unsuspecting sky.

…

Madoka Kaname walked along empty roads. Ms. Miki felt somewhat guilty for allowing Sayaka to just take off with that Kamijo boy the way she had, but Madoka thought nothing of it. For Ms. Miki to understand, she needed to have been privy to months of Sayaka emotions, existing in a flux of heartfelt emotions. Rather than spill the beans, Madoka simply smiled and headed home. Ms. Miki happily called the Kaname residence to let Madoka's parents know where she had been, and there was no harm done.

Even though her best friend had left for the best possible reason, Madoka felt deeply unsatisfied. She had finally decided to become a Puella Magi and end the madness; what was she supposed to wish for? Madoka didn't have someone specific to help—and even then, Mami said never to do that—and she had everything she desired. Couldn't she just wish to be a Puella Magi and get it over with?

"Madoka Kaname! It's nice to see you!"

Madoka's feet cemented themselves to the ground.

She could remember that voice anywhere. It was the voice that had torn down her world in one fell swoop. It was not the one that had brought to light her own role to play—that was Alice's, of course—but this one was just as frightening. This one had beaten transfer student Homura Akemi to a pulp, and according to Sayaka, had nearly killed Mami altogether.

And yet, here she was, outside of her Puella Magi garb. Here she was, standing on the street corner, her soul gem in her green headband and her bangs covering her forehead like any other girl.

Madoka tried to speak, but her brain had lost the instruction manual. "It's…I…"

"Cat got your tongue?"

Madoka started to slur her words into one blubbering mess of terror—

"It's no problem!" The girl shrugged. Her grin seemed entirely synthetic. "We haven't even been officially introduced.

"I'm Aoki Chika, Puella Magi extraordinaire."

A/N: This chapter likely reads pretty weakly. I've been a bit pressed for time by the forces of the world, so if there's anything I could do to revise this one, hit that 'review' button!


	11. The Estranged Team Madoka

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-The Estranged Team Madoka

"Your sister?" Xulbey asked in an unflinching monotone, trying desperately to cover his surprise. He managed to suppress the terrified stutter, but his words lacked any sort of commanding effect. The time for that had passed. "I wasn't aware you had a sister."

"I thought the Great and Powerful Xulbey knew everything?" Alice replied curtly. Her gloved hand hung in the air as if strung up like a master puppeteer, swirling in small circles and led by her index finger. The empty space around it seemed to spiral, forming waves in nothingness. Xulbey blinked rapidly.

Was he seeing things?

Alice caught his dumbfounded stare and chuckled. "Stop looking so surprised," she chided. "I'm only doing what we said to do. Remember the plan?"

"Explain something to me," the Incubator said. "Reviving Chika was not part of this. Not yet...you claim she lives again. So why—?"

"To lead your army? Duh," Alice nodded. Xulbey felt the juvenile, uncaring infliction hit him like a ton of lead bricks; compared to her previously calculating demeanor, this magical Alice had a different personality altogether. It was like speaking to a child with a loaded gun. "How did you think I find the perfect leader? Chika might not be exactly on her rocker...

"But it's not like I'm all there, either, you know." Alice flashed a teeth-filled smile.

Every strand of his deep black fur suddenly stood on end; a jolt of raw electricity filled Xulbey's alien veins, injecting the Incubator with unabated fight-or-flight instincts. He struggled to keep his paws grounded and to keep himself in the iconic, catatonic Incubator pose as he faced down a power he hadn't dreamed of creating. And yet, even if he could keep his body from giving in to its natural instincts and running like the wind, there was no way he could pretend to disguise his thoughts.

This was worse than bad; this was a game over.

A Puella Magi—literally a young magical girl—was simple enough to control. Xulbey had done it before: he had convinced Yuma Chitose to form a contract, after all. He had contracted enough girls before that to start his own uprising on their home planet, and he managed to concoct this entire scheme that was, in his brilliantly conniving mind, nothing more than manipulating seven little girls into place. And Xulbey existed for this calling, _thrived_ on knowing all there was to know, like being the only one looking in on his hamsters as they ran through their stationary wheels. He was able to influence, but powerless to decide. No Incubator in existence lived for anything else. It was their mission. This was their reason to exist.

But as Xulbey looked at Alice, standing in a majestic ball gown created from magic that would normally create a simple tunic fit for a middle school dance, demonstrating more power in her index figner than Kyoko Sakura and Yuma Chitose had in her entire arsenal, laughing _at_ him instead of _with_ him—

Xulbey felt a very unfamiliar crawl up his spine.

"Are you afraid, little kitty cat?"

She wasn't even looking at him anymore. And it wasn't like he could just answer; any response would betray him. There was no way to lie and pretend this was in the manual, no way to play it off as though he had a contingency plan in case of…_anything_. Xulbey had to simply sit and watch the show as his plan was hijacked.

"What's it like, kitty?" Alice sang. "You know, being usurped or whatever you'd call it."

Xulbey remained quiet as he watched the sky shift. The clouds began to center in a circle over Mitakihara, drifting slowly but surely like boats left in a draining bathtub. As the precious final seconds of his scheme counted down to oblivion, Xulbey ran scenarios in his calculating mind.

Alice might be a potentially godlike entity, but Xulbey was unlike his immature comrades. There was more to him than just met the eye. He was like no other Incubator; he was Xulbey the Rogue.

Xulbey the Rogue, unlike any other being in this world, knew what Alice _truly_ was. Xulbey, rather than any other creation in the universe, knew what Alice could create and destroy, and as panic shot through him, Xulbey found a sudden calm. There was one way to regain control of the situation. There remained one way to manipulate this to leave him on top.

Xulbey saw his third option.

It was not pretty. It was not his style, and it was not anywhere in any part of the tome that was his cosmic plot.

But it was a play. His final play. And if he continued to play his cards right...

Xulbey spoke, as always, with a smile on his face. He announced the one fact that, above all, could never be denied. The one fact that each and every Incubator in the universe knew was written in stone—

"Madoka Kaname will stop you."

Alice's head fell backward in a boisterous, powerful laugh. It wasn't the reaction the Incubator was expecting.

"Are you joking?" Alice boasted, hand spinning faster and faster. "_Madoka_? Madoka _Kaname_? That pigtailed kid is a joke. If I don't kill her, that poor girl's self-esteem will."

"Maybe," Xulbey agreed. "Maybe not. Either way, we have yet to fully neutralize Madoka as a threat. Without me in your plan, Madoka—"

Alice's hand shot down, lying perfectly parallel to her body in an iron line. Her head rotated to face the Incubator as though it were on a stick, twisted by the puppet master of her magical might. A deep violet flooded Xulbey's vision as she stared at him, and him alone.

"I'm ashamed of you, kitty," Alice chided. "You must think we're stupid.

"What, did you think I had somehow _assumed_ that this was the credits playing? That I just…I don't know, _forgot_ about Madoka Kaname? _Forgot_ about the unlimited wealth of magic she holds?

"About her best friend, Sayaka Miki, who became a Puella Magi no more than a day ago? And then there's Homura Akemi…but that's what Chika's for. Her and Tomoe and maybe even Kyoko and Yuma Chitose, too.

"See, you keep thinking that I won't be able to take care of the estranged Team Madoka. That somehow your amazing, Incubator-ly foresight alone will keep me from being utterly embarrassed in a fight.

"I know Madoka Kaname, and trust me, Incubator. You are joking."

She turned to face Xulbey straight-on. Her head rocked from side to side at her own words, as though she were impressed with herself. "But, hey? What have I got to worry about?" She chuckled. "It's not like I'm dealing with the Sailor Scouts here, Xulbey."

"You're underestimating—"

"No, I'm not!" Alice shouted. Her voice ripping through the silent apartment and bouncing back at them with intimidation in spades. Alice took a quick breath to compose herself.

"Look at it realistically, kitty. Sayaka's had," she counted on her fingers, "What, five hours so far with her powers? Homura Akemi's strong, but…I mean, do you see what I'm wearing? Please," she added her own teasing smirk.

"Then there's Kyoko and Mami to deal with…or not to. If they decide to skip town, then whatever. If they come back, I'll kill them. Easy as pie."

Alice snapped her fingers in the air as if ordering a maid around. That she could deal with lives so simply...Xulbey twitched his front paw as he tried to remain still.

"The only real threat is Madoka getting her powers—not to mention finally growing a pair—and doing something for once in her tragically pink life. An we both know that's not going to happen."

Alice smiled thinly. Her eyes sneered.

"Is there anything else you wanted to ask? Before you go running to Team Madoka for help? Especially since, you know, they'll take you in with open arms. Savior Xulbey the Rogue, here to guide the prodigal girls to victory."

"They have to accept me," Xulbey said with a conviction surprising the confident Alice. "I'm the only one left that can contract Madoka, after all. She needs an Incubator.

"And if you recall, since I created you, Alice...you cannot kill me." The words felt like a comforting shield. No matter what Alice did or said, she could not harm her own Incubator. After worming around the rules for what felt like a lifetime, they began to play his way.

"I can't _directly _harm you...that's not to say that if I turn Mitakihara into a smoking pit, that you'll necessarily survive the outcome."

A silence passed as Xulbey became perfectly still. He'd said all he could say. Alice had become driven mad with the expanse of her own innate power. She couldn't stop Xulbey from contracting Madoka, but if the other girls got to her before Chika, then she might have to speed up the next phase...

"It's so funny," Alice laughed as she broke her train of thought.

"I don't see anything to laugh about."

"Of course you wouldn't, you super-serious furball. It's just," Alice leaned her head back and released a lackadaisical yawn, "You know, with all of these timelines that Homura Akemi's been making, you'd think Madoka wouldn't be important in at least one of them.

"What is it about her?"

...Xulbey left without another word.

What was it about Madoka Kaname? What was it about his young girl around whose life or death the Universe revolved?

For the sake of the world—his plan to end the Puella Magi system nonwithstanding—Xulbey hoped it was something good.

…

"Hey, blue ball?" Kyosuke stopped playing with the strands of hair in Sayaka's face, stopped laughing at the way she would giggle uncontrollably, and pointed a lax finger to the sky. "What's that?"

Sayaka didn't follow his gesture; she instead watched in silent wonder as his finger extended with a familiar precision. It was unlike a motion unlike any other in the world; Kyosuke's tendons made no wasted movements. He had regained the calm, composed control from before the accident, and with every twitch of his every digit, Sayaka could see the boon of her wish. She had restored a life.

And because of it, her own life had Kyosuke Kamijo in it again.

How could this have been bad? Sayaka had almost allowed Homura to keep her from getting the one thing she truly wanted in the world. Where was the regret Homura had promised? It was bliss—

A strong breeze kicked up from behind Sayaka, tossing her hair and her dress in every which way. Bags of the passerby flew out of hands and crashed against walls, clothing flew, wrappers danced in the air. Sayaka leapt from the bench—

Kyosuke embraced her without a second's hesitation—

It was something like a dream of a dream. Standing in a whirlwind inside the warmth of Kyosuke's arms, where nothing could touch her, and she was free to admire the boy she'd given her life for. The world around them melted away for a fraction of a second that felt like half of a century.

But it wasn't meant to last. Looking up into the sky, Sayaka learned that there was something that could definitely harm her. Her, Kyosuke, and probably every single girl on the face of the planet. Something she had never seen before.

The sky was tearing itself apart from the inside-out.

A grotesque hole hung above them, funneling into a pointed nose. It looked like a popped pimple in the world's complexion, but as the wind continued to burst through Mitakihara, Sayaka imagined it more serious than an everyday break-out.

"Sayaka!"

Kyubey's voice soared through her mind. That was the last bit of evidence she needed to hear. It was hero time.

"I see it!" Sayaka thought back. She was surprised how hard it was to keep her thoughts straight while in Kyosuke's caring embrace. "It's Xulbey, isn't it!"

"Xulbey's not the problem!" Kyubey replied. "I need you now. It's Madoka!"

...Of course it was Madoka.

Of course, in her first moment of happiness since this entire outlandish battle of good and evil began, Madoka would be in mortal peril. To say nothing of the tear in the sky that formed around them like a growing death sentence.

_This, _Sayaka thought, must be her curse. It wasn't that Kyosuke would leave her and that she would fall to despair from that. No, this was far more perlious: Kyosuke would stay by her side, but she would have to leave and fight.

As much as it pained her to say it, as much as Sayaka wished it were different, she knew what she had to do. It had been an unfair trade from the beginning, but she had accepted it on that lonely street with the mysterious transfer student staring her in her sobbing face.

Sayaka looked up at a concerned Kyosuke, their hair and clothing flowing in one uninterrupted motion. She looked into his deep gray eyes, the eyes that wanted to protect her from whatever was happening—

"Kyosuke?" She choked out. "I...I need to tell you something—"

"What are you—"

"There's no time," She hurried. "Just listen to me!"

…

Madoka struggled to keep her eye contact with the animal-like Aoki Chika, but the winds kicked at her face and dug at her clothing. She didn't understand; what was happening? She had only once seen Chika fight, but her power didn't have anything to do with controlling the weather...right?

"Ignore this," Chika shrugged and waved a lax hand. "It's just my sister doing her thing."

'My sister'.

Madoka understood instantly.

"Alice," Madoka said under her light breath. "She's doing this? How? Why? Wh—"

"What Alice is doing doesn't really concern you at the moment, kid," Chika said. Her nimble hands wandered to the emerald-colored headband. "Right now, I've got to make sure you're not a problem."

"B-but I'm not," Madoka blubbered accidentally. She had tried to be strong, but the sight of Chika reaching to her headband sent her spiraling into a panic. For all of Alice's menacing mannerisms, something about her told Madoka that she had been somehow safe in that mysterious girl's presence. Chika's brash smile, pointed teeth, and wide, emotionless eyes told a more sinister story.

This was the look of a jaguar: poised and always ready to kill, without emotion and without remorse.

This was the Chika that had nearly impaled Mami Tomoe, the best Magical Girl that Madoka and Sayaka knew. She had smashed Mami into the pavement, and even though Sayaka said that she had died, somehow death was cheap—

Chika's smile dropped into a halfway-genuine frown. "What's the matter?" She asked in that way a teacher asks a lonely girl on Valentine's Day. "Won't you...I don't know, plead for your life or something? Say something other than whiny gibberish?"

The wind's howl grew louder. A viscious ringing sounded in Madoka's ears. She could barely hear herself think. The world was loud, and Chika's eyes demonic.

Madoka couldn't read the girl's lips or make out the words against the howl of the wind, but she could see the hand hover to the gem on her headband. Madoka prepared to see her short, barely-teenaged life flash before her eyes—

She shut her wide eyes tight, expecting the pearly gates—

—And nothing happened. She was still alive, counting the agonizing seconds. Still nothing came.

Was Chika the type to savor the kill? Maybe she was the kind to make things last?

The wind had died down enough to hear another, deeper, monotone voice enter the fray.

"If you touch that gem, I swear on my life that you'll be dead before you hit the ground," said Homura Akemi, outside of her Puella Magi uniform, wearing simply a knee-length skirt and a blouse. She looked like any other young girl walking the streets...except both Madoka and her attacker knew better.

They knew that this was no simple child.

This was Homura Akemi, the mysterious transfer student. Homura Akemi, the dark-haired, quiet girl that fiercely battled Chika on the rooftop that day; the girl that had no obvious goal in any of this. She was here to save Madoka's life, that much was basically certain...but why?

Madoka figured that she probably shouldn't look a gift Homura in the mouth.

"Homura Akemi!" Chika said with a jubilant pop to her voice. "It's nice to see you're still around. How've you been, kid?"

The motion was almost too quick for Madoka to follow: Chika twisted her arm to break Homura's hold. Homura altered the situation, turning it into an obscure ballroom dance. The two switched places: Homura stood before Madoka now, arm outstretched and protective as Chika strode before them, the smile back in full force.

Chika spoke like an old family relative. "You know, when Kyoko Sakura killed me, there was only one thought going through my mind.

"You know what it was?" Chika asked nostalgically.

Madoka shook her head.

"It was, 'man, I wish I got to fight Homura Akemi again!' I mean, Mami Tomoe was good exercise, but she was far from a challenge. She's such a goodie-two-shoes, and absolutely no fun to fight. What a bore.

"You," Chika said as she looked Homura up and down like a would-be suitor, "I remember you used to have quite the moves."

Madoka's eyebrow shot up. That was certainly _one_ way to describe fighting twenty feet in the air with rocket launchers.

Homura's breathing, Madoka noticed, was slow and controlled. It was as though she were in a different situation altogether, one where the the sky weren't tearing apart and an evil Puella Magi wasn't staring the two of them down. Madoka's first impression of the brooding, intense girl had been spot-on: she never lost her cool, even for a moment. This was no simple show of bravery; Homura had no fear.

Chika undoubtedly took notice; her hungry eyes lost their appetite.

"Nothing that I can't handle," Chika said lowly. "You won't even be an adequate appetizer for my main course."

Chika began to circle the two, like a lion and her meal.

"See, here's the thing about me and my sister. Right now, she's becoming a Puella Magi for the very first time. Her powers are being unlocked, and they're growing as we speak. Honestly, I don't know how strong she'll be."

Homura's breathing grew deeper.

"How does that affect me, you're wondering?" Chika rolled her eyes. "Well, my sister doesn't have to play by the rules. But you both know all about that."

Madoka and Homura each remembered their own experiences with the elusive Alice.

"My point is...let's just say I have my own loopholes."

A green burst of light erupted before them—

Aoki Chika charged forth, her green tunic adorned and her battle-hardened scowl set in place. She dove foot-first into Homura; the dark Magical Girl was more than ready, her off-hand catching Chika's heeled foot long before it reached its mark. Even outside of her uniform, even without the use of her magical powers, Homura had skill to spare.

Chika drew back into a twisting motion, recalling her foot and reaching to her headband. The verdant whip extended from it without so much glint of sunlight; the whip chord crashed against the sidewalk like that of a skilled lion hunter—

The whip charged for the two girls with the force of a typhoon behind it. A human Homura could never stop this—

"Sayaka, now!"

A blue blur raced forth from seemingly nowhere, almost summoned only from Homura's words to land within an inch of Madoka and Homura, blue dress engaged and saber bared. Madoka could barely recognize her best friend, the Sayaka Miki who stayed up at night dreaming about a boy and who overslept for class in the morning; this Sayaka Miki's demeanor was hard—

Her slash was harder—

The whip fell apart as Sayaka's weapon sliced through it like warm butter. As Chika bounced back from the surprise strike to land shakily, Homura seized the opportunity to don her own uniform. Chika's cheap shot had left the building: two Magical Girls stood between her and her frightened target.

It wasn't a problem; just a complication.

Chika reformed the whip; it extended from the hilt again as she waved her arm through the air. The whip crashed against the tearing wind with a thunderclap.

Homura snatched Madoka's paralyzed hand and stuck it to her own ornate shield. Sayaka did the same as Chika came forth yet again—

The whip struck nothing but air. The three girls had escaped on the hair of their teeth.

A/N: I'm back! Not only that, but I've outlined the rest of Cyclical Magica, so expect steady, writer's-block-less updates. There's ten more chapters from this point on. Strap in, true believers!


	12. Nothing Lives Forever

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

-Nothing Lives Forever

Madoka imagined that this was what heaven for smart people looked like.

The girls materialized inside Homura's home. The fancy, ornate paintings and photographs on the wall seemed to rotate and hover, as if held up by magic. Madoka rubbed her weary eyes to make sure she wasn't seeing things. The matching furniture almost melted into the wall; it was like standing in the artistic afterlife. The only thing out of place in that respect was the map of Mitakihara City, plastered on a wall and marked up with all manner of marker.

Flashes of blue and black shined temporary color on the room; Sayaka and Homura stood again in their street attire. Madoka wanted to ask Sayaka where she had come from, why the distinct frown on her face appeared so genuine, and why she was wearing that dress—

On second thought, Madoka bit her tongue.

"Girls!" A caring voice resounded through their minds. "I'm glad to see we all made it here in one piece."

Madoka remembered Kyubey from their first meeting, only two days ago, in the cafe with the sisterly Mami Tomoe. From the brief words they had exchanged—introductions and the breakdown of the the world of witches, Puella Magi, and the threat on her life—Madoka understood the Incubator to be a trustworthy being. He had given Mami and Sayaka their powers, and in all likelihood, had empowered Homura as well. Kyubey was their mentor and guardian.

Something in the back of her mind said otherwise, but she couldn't put her finger on it exactly.

Kyubey leapt to the sofa as the girls stood around him. Any thought that this wasn't a deathly-serious situation she had found herself in dissipated instantly. Homura had teleported her and Sayaka to nothing short of a war room.

"Madoka! It's good to see you're okay," Kyubey said. When Homura fidgeted ever so slightly, the Incubator pretended not to notice. "I was worried that we might not get to you in time."

Madoka sat tentatively on the sofa, as if she were expecting Homura to kick her out. When it was clear that wouldn't happen, Madoka cleared her throat. "Aoki Chika," she started. She was unsure of how to finish that sentence.

"Aoki Chika is supposed to be dead," Sayaka interrupted, the name coming out in an explosive burst. "I saw that other Puella Magi kill her. I know I did. Remember, Kyubey? That red girl," Sayaka recalled.

"Kyoko Sakura," Kyubey nodded. "One of Mami's closer friends." He appeared to think for a moment before continuing. "I hate to say it, but that might explain Mami's absence in all of this."

"Of _course_ Mami isn't here," Sayaka said. "She's out helping people. That's what Mami does, right? She's the good guy."

The hanging pause made Madoka's stomach churn. Alice's prediction—that Mami would die regardless of her own actions—had never truly washed over.

Homura intervened before Kyubey could steer the conversation any more than he already had. "We need to focus on what resources we have," Homura said. "We are facing an emergency.

"Obviously," she smirked.

"I can see _that_, transfer student," said an annoyed Sayaka. "What are we supposed to do about it? When I said that Xulbey—"

"This is not Xulbey's doing. This crisis is caused by another Puella Magi." Kyubey's voice dropped suddenly, as if he wasn't sure he was using the right phrase. It was either that or Kyubey himself was afraid of the answer, and Madoka desperately hoped that was not the case. "Madoka and Homura, you are both familiar with Alice, correct?"

The two nodded.

"I don't understand how she has this much power," Kyubey said, "But this is her doing. I spoke with an associate of mine—an Incubator called Jubey—and we both agree that what we are seeing in the sky is discinctly caused by Magical Girl energy.

"That said, the goal of this display is distinctly _not_ within the parameters of an average Puella Magi."

The girls held their breath—

"The tear in the sky is funneling every witch, all over the world, into Mitakihara City. Regardless of the Puella Magi's mission to _destroy _witches, Alice is poised to cause a witch-fueled apocalypse. If we act fast, it might be possible to—"

"Slow down!" Sayaka said. The loudness of her own voice seemed to surprise her. "Every witch. That's not possible...right? I mean, you and Mami made it sound like there's a bunch of witches in this town alone. How many witches...?"

"If Jubey's calculations were correct, we will be looking a first wave of two hundred thousand, five hundred and sixty-three witches entering Mitakihara.

"And as much as I hate to say it, that _is_ an exact count."

Sayaka's face bleached. How were they supposed to fight that? As Puella Magi, their job was to protect people; how many girls would it take to fight two hundred _thousand_ witches? This said nothing of how much power Alice has to be channeling to create something like that. Kyubey and this friend of his definitely hit the nail on the head: Alice was so far beyond Sayaka and Homura—and even Mami—that it was almost a joke. It _had_ to be a joke. Like a cruel punchline to this whole violent game.

Sayaka's small hand hovered over the blue ring on her finger. Just a day ago, the Soul gem was a call to heroism. Now, she wasn't so sure that a Soul Gem was anything more than a death sentence...

"If we kill Alice, will the hole close?"

The boldness of Homura's unfazed question shocked everyone in the room. A confused Kyubey spoke with a shaken voice, "We approached that scenario," he sounded as if he were giving a remedial lecture. "At this stage, it is impossible to kill her. Alice has gotten too strong. If she becomes any more powerful than she already is, she will be nothing short of immortal.

"And believe me! I don't use that term lightly," Kyubey released a hallow laugh.

"That's a lie, Kyubey," Homura shot. "Nothing lives forever. Unless Alice is some kind of a God or something—"

"She isn't a _God," _Kyubey said, his 'voice' growing more irritated with Homura's interruptions. " But...long story short, Chika's existence is preventing us from killing Alice."

"Aoki Chika can be removed from the picture," Homura boasted. "I almost killed her last time we fought. If I can find her off-guard—"

"Listen to me, Homura," Kyubey ordered. Madoka looked to Sayaka for some kind of understanding; why were the two at each other's throats like this? Wasn't a Puella Magi supposed to work with her Incubator? "I am honestly trying to help you," he continued. "It is always your own prerogative to listen to me or not, but I am telling you the truth because you are one of only a handful of humans that can prevent this outcome.

"Alice and Chika are more than sisters," Kyubey finished. "They are the same entity."

…

They were so close.

They had come so close to happiness, Mami could almost taste it. She could taste the pastries she would make somewhere far away from Mitakihara, far away from Japan and maybe far away from this side of the world. She could have ceased being a hero for as long as they wanted, stopping their tracks only for the occasional Grief Seed before moving on. Kyoko, Mami, and Yuma would have been the three amigos, traveling the world with nothing but what they could carry. No money, no roots, no evil Magical Girls and no Incubators. Just life. Just _freedom; _that was all she wanted.

It was romantic, and because of that, it was something Mami realized she could never have.

Mami Tomoe sat at her living room table, a cleared plate of pastries sitting in the middle between her and the perpetually-jolly, green-haired Yuma Chitose.

The television had delivered the final referendum on the life and times of Mami Tomoe.

"...this is our twenty-sixth sighting of creatures that civilians can only refer to as 'monsters' that appear to be falling from the sky..."

"...the National Guard has been deployed, but all reports are that these creatures are unfazed by anything thrown at them..."

"...evacuations of Mitakihara City and all outlying counties are underway..."

Kyoko leaned against the kitchen counter, a strand of hair wrapped around her index finger.

"I don't suppose you're going to tell me how I caused this?" Kyoko asked with sarcasm. "Believe me, I didn't. I don't know what the _hell_ that is." That was only half-true, and she knew it as she said it. Kyoko knew from the beginning that Xulbey was pure evil, and she knew that she was helping him obtain his goal simply by setting foot in Mitakihara City with him. Ulterior motive or not, Kyoko had been used like a pawn.

Thankfully, Kyoko specialized in seeing certain details her way.

"It's witches falling from the sky, Kyoko!" Yuma grinned. "Pay attention!"

Kyoko rolled her eyes. It would be nice to have that kind of an optimistic, cheerful outlook. Yuma was more like Kyoko than Kyoko herself: completely devoid of any sense to help others. It wasn't born out of spite like it was in Kyoko; Yuma simply thought that the world took care of itself. To her, the three girls could leave and everything would get sorted out. Perhaps that was why she and Yuma stuck together after all this time; they were more alike than the other realized.

The motionless Mami, eyes and ears glued to the reports on the plasma screen, told the exact opposite story.

From the way this was looking, any instant Mami could turn around and say that they were staying and saving the day...if that was even possible. Or, Mami could stand up and want to leave immediately. After all, Mami was leaving in the first place because she felt she had done enough for the people of Mitakihara City, right? Didn't she deserve a vacation? A reprieve? A retirement? There would always be another witch attack. There would always be some kind of crisis. Mami couldn't just come out of retirement as soon as someone needed help...

...Right?

Kyoko walked into the living room with her aloof gait in full swing. With a smooth motion, she turned off the television and sat in front of Mami. The golden girl had frozen; even her lively curls hung motionless. Mami's liquid honey eyes might as well have been made of porcelain.

"Mams?"

Mami blinked; her breathing came back, but that was it, and only just.

"Mams, here's the deal." Kyoko took a deep breath before continuing. "I get it. I do. You're the hero, and I'm not. I left town, you stayed and became, like, the Batman of Mitakihara. It's not lost on me.

"So if you want to stay and protect this city, I'll understand.

"But you also said that you want to leave, right? Because you think that you've done all that you need to for the schmucks around here. I get that too."

Yuma stifled a giggle at the optimal word choice.

Kyoko kicked herself—she knew what the answer was going to be, she could see it coming from a mile away—but she had to ask anyway. She had come back to town for Mami; there was no point in coming all this way if she didn't know how that same Mami felt throughout all of this. Kyoko made her point in a clear voice.

"Whatever you want to do, Yuma and I are gonna stay with you."

That snapped Mami from her daze. She reeled back, as if she were recovering from a punch. "Come again? Kyoko—"

"We're doing whatever you want," Kyoko reaffirmed. "You hear that, Yuma? Stay or leave, it's up to Mams here."

Mami shook her head feverishly. "I can't—I—no, Kyoko! No. _No._"

"Why not?" The crimson Puella Magi smirked.

"Because..." Mami's eyes trailed back to the death and destruction she'd seen on the screen. She imagined how much was to come if she didn't stay.

She saw what could happen to Sayaka Miki and Madoka Kaname if—

Kyoko fell back on her hands and shrugged. An understanding flew between them: Mami knew that she wasn't likely to come back from this. Like it or not, this was unlike anything they had ever encountered before. And on top of that, there were people—friends and strangers alike—that Mami cared for in this city.

Leaving was no longer an option. Mami silently wondered if it ever really was.

"So this is how we're gonna do this?" Kyoko said slowly. She tried to avoid saying anything to scare the still-oblivious Yuma. Death was not exactly a common topic of discussion."Well, I guess you never really see it coming..."

"Kyoko, you don't have to do this—"

"Zip it, Mams!" Kyoko put a finger to Mami's lips, her canine smile unrelenting. "Instead of fighting for a ton of people I don't know—which is _so_ not my style—think of it as, I'm helping _you_ help all of those people _you _don't know. Fair enough?

"Yuma, kid?" The red ponytail whipped around as Kyoko turned to face the little girl. "Hate to tell you this, but we're staying. The world needs its hero, and today, we're the sidekicks."

Yuma perked up, confused. "I thought you said the world could take its problems and shove—"

"I _did_," Kyoko chuckled. "But like I said, it still needs its hero, and she needs us."

A sole thought raced through Mami's mind. The thought that she couldn't vocalize, because if she said anything, all of the mixed emotions would come out in a supernova of tears. Between the fear, the anxiety, the horror, and the realization that Kyoko was going to stand with her, after all of this time, because of something she thought had died between them a lifetime ago...

All Mami could do was nod, smile, and hope that Kyoko didn't see her eyes welling up.

_Thank you_, Mami thought.

…

"What do you mean? They're _not_ the same person. I mean, for one thing, they have separate bodies. Are Alice and Chika siamese twins or something?" Sayaka felt the ridiculousness of her own question as it left her lips, but couldn't come up with a better way to ask it.

"I didn't even get them being sisters," Sayaka continued, "I don't buy anyone like that Chika girl having a family. She's an animal."

Madoka raised her hand before talking. Even now, when she was quite possibly the most important individual in the room, she felt inadequate next to the warriors Homura and Sayaka. Kyubey humored her, nodding his head in her direction.

"When I talked to Alice yesterday," Madoka stopped. "It's more like she cornered me, r-really, and I didn't know what to say, and I didn't tell her anything about any of you," she gestured across the room. Homura understood what this was: the pink-haired girl felt guilty for associating with the enemy. Once again, Madoka's greatest charm—her loyalty to her friends—shined through.

Madoka stopped a third time. Once she was certain she had gathered her thoughts, she began again. This time, her intent was crystal-clear as she sparkled with sincerity.

"Alice was just like any other girl when she was talking to me. I was afraid because I knew that Xulbey had told her to kill me,"Alice had come to tell her that personally, "But if I just met her from school , I wouldn't have thought anything wrong about her."

Sayaka had known her best friend all her life; though it didn't make sense to Sayaka herself, she knew exactly how the wheels in Madoka's head were turning. Madoka thought back to her meeting with Alice, back in the cafe over a plate of donuts, and thought about what had happened. She focused on the words.

While it felt at the time like Alice was threatening her life, Madoka realized that it was just the opposite. Alice warned her that Mami Tomoe would die, and according to Sayaka, Mami would have if not for the other two Puella Magi appearing at just the right time. Alice warned Madoka not to trust the Incubators, because neither of them knew exactly what the mysterious beings were up to, and true to her word, Madoka remained in the dark about the bulk of the events as they progressed.

Alice told Madoka that her goal was to kill her.

But if that was so, why didn't she do it right then? If Alice has enough power to bring every witch in the world to one ordinary city in Japan, then why didn't she kill Madoka when she had the chance? This would all have been over. And conversely, when Chika had Madoka alone for less than a minute, the verdant Puella Magi had wasted no time in trying to kill her.

Madoka made up her mind. It was the only thing to her that could never change, the only part of her personality that she had accepted as something to be proud of:

"I...I kind of know what people are like when I meet them," she said. Sayaka knew this already; it was an admission for Kyubey and Homura, the latter of which was already more than intimately privy to Madoka's flaws. "I'm good with first impressions...and I'm almost never wrong. And the only reason I was really afraid of Alice was because I felt like I had to be, but she did nothing even kind of scary...she bought me donuts," she giggled morbidly.

"So, what I'm trying to say is...I don't think that Alice is evil.

"No...I know that she isn't evil."

…

"Yuma, go wait outside, will you?"

"What about the, uh...army of witches?"

"Just stand right outside the door," Kyoko said with the flick of her wrist. "We'll be right there. And don't transform until we do. You hear me?"

Yuma nodded happily, standing up to brush the crumbs off of her shirt before skipping out of the door like a little girl headed for Disneyland. Mami had come to her senses, but she still hadn't budged from her seat on the floor. Once Yuma had left and closed the door behind her, Kyoko stood up quickly and pulled the blond hero to her feet.

Kyoko looked deep into Mami's red, puffy, crystalline eyes. The sight of a Mami Tomoe on the verge of tears struck one of the only two chords in Kyoko's heart.

"Come on, dry up," Kyoko chided in a playful voice. Mami instinctively closed her eyes as Kyoko ran a thumb across them. The tears fell from her eyelashes and cascaded down her porcelain cheeks like the most majestic of waterfalls. "There's no way we're gonna make it out of this alive if we don't believe we will, right? So get rid of that attitude. The three of us are gonna go out there and beat the holy hell out of those witches."

The plan obviously wasn't thought through. Protecting the people was just damage control to whatever Xulbey was doing. However, Kyubey had his own group of Puella Magi, and Kyoko was willing to bet her right hand that the Incubator was planning a counter-attack to achieve _his_ own end. _Those_ girls, she thought, were going into a death trap. Not her and Mami and Yuma, though.

Kyoko waited for Mami's eyes to dry and her hands to stop shaking before stepping away from her. "I'm gonna steal an apple for the road, and then it's off to save the world. It's what you do best, right? This is the status quo for you," she finished with a bob of red hair. Kyoko walked away—

Mami's frigid hand shot out, taking Kyoko's with lightning speed. Mami's sad eyes now held another, more genuine quality.

"Mams?"

"If I," her voice started to crack, "If anything happens..."

Mami paused—

"I want you to know that I...that when you left, I was never angry with you. Ever."

Kyoko shot up an amused eyebrow. "Never?" She repeated, as though it were wordplay in a child's riddle. "Never _ever_ ever?" She added a smirk, but instantly regretted it. The honesty in Mami Tomoe was deadly serious.

The girls looked into each other's eyes, as though they had become the windows into one another's souls—

"Not even for a second," Mami finished.

…

"It doesn't matter whether or not Alice is evil," Kyubey's monotone returned in full force, "The problem is that she is causing this influx of witches. It's pure suicide to fight the witches with our numbers. The only thing we can do is fight Alice head-on, and hope that defeating her seals the hole."

Sayaka folded her arms. "Isn't that what you just said we _couldn't_ do?"

Kyubey looked to Homura for any kind of interruption or monologue. The dark-haired girl only nodded for Kyubey to continue.

"We believe that Alice and Chika are the same being because their magic functions on the same frequency. Normally, each Puella Magi has an individual frequency. Think of it as a signature that is added to every act a Puella Magi does with her magic. These are _supposed_ to be unique, but our two opponents share the same exact one.

"The funny part is, the only way we Incubators know that a Puella Magi has died is by feeling that her frequency has, to use the phrase, flatlined.

"When Chika died the first time, her frequency did not die because Alice was around to keep it functioning. And it appears that Alice was able to revive Chika by that sole truth."

Homura concluded the lecture. "And you and this Jubey have no reason to believe that the reverse won't hold true if we kill Alice." The scenario flashed through her mind's eye: supposing that Alice could be killed, she might be able to come back instantly, her powers restored by an unharmed Chika.

The pieces had come together: the only way to stop the witches was to kill Alice, and to do that, they had to kill Chika at—or at least around—the same time.

Sayaka turned to Homura, her muscles firm and unyielding, "It looks like we're in this together then, transfer student."

"Excuse me?"

"There's only the two of us, and we've got to fight the two of them. You _need_ me. Come on, admit it," Sayaka smiled. Homura said some mean things a few days ago, but at this moment, they had to function as equals. It was a brilliant feeling, all things considered.

Homura dodged the bonding opportunity altogether. "Let me get this straight. Your plan is...what, for you to fight Aoki Chika while I go after Alice? You, who's been a Puella Magi for about a day, would be up against _her_."

Madoka noticed how Homura tactfully refrained from describing herself fighting Alice. If Alice could tear a hole in the sky and manipulate memories, was there any telling what she was capable of?

"There's nothing else we can do!" Sayaka gripped the edge of the sofa. Frustration radiated through her teal eyes. "We don't know where Mami is, right? And we don't have enough time to find her. It's just the two of us—"

A second voice rang through their four minds—

A voice that Madoka had only heard once, on a battle-ravaged rooftop of a school that no longer existed—

The voice that would cause so much death—

"You would be going straight to hell," said Xulbey the Rogue, standing at the edge of the entrance to Homura Akemi's home. His green eyes and black fur more than stood out against the divine white walls; he more than clashed with the benign white and red of Kyubey. To Madoka's eyes, Xulbey was a blotch on the wall, a stain with eerie green eyes that drilled into her with unrelenting force.

Sayaka's hand raced for her ring before Homura even saw the antagonist before them—

"I would not do that if I were you," Xulbey said.

"Oh? And why's that?" Sayaka said, filling herself with venom. "Give me one good reason not to rip your little head off—"

"Because at this stage in her transformation, Alice is attuned to every sign of magic in Mitakihara, from both witches and Puella Magi alike. Transforming would only alert her to our location, and if what I've overheard is correct, then you understand that Chika would come here as well."

"Homura Akemi," Xulbey turned his head like a doll on a pivot, "You might have been able to defeat Chika before. However, as Alice grows in strength by the second, Chika grows more powerful as well. I was not aware of their connection until it was too late to play it to my advantage, but—"

"That's _enough!_" Sayaka shouted through the angelic walls. Her voice reverberated through every bone in Madoka's body. She had never seen Sayaka so worked up, so frustrated, so angry with anything in both of their lives. Sayaka's fists clenched so tight that they looked ready to explode; her eyes boiled over with liquid anger.

"How—I—_who _do you think you are, to barge in here like this and tell _us_ what to do?" Sayaka roared. "'To play it to my advantage'. This whole thing is _your_ fault! _You're_ the antagonist here, in case you forgot! We're not the ones trying to kill Madoka, we're not the ones trying to use…_whatever_ Alice is to accomplish some supervillain-like plot of doom; we're the ones trying to fix it!

"And you're going to tell _us_ what we can and can't do? Sorry, but I've had enough of people telling me what I'm not capable of. If you don't mind," she finished. She hoped Homura heard the message, too.

The tension in the air hung with a terminal thickness. Homura and Madoka stood at opposite ends of the room; there was nothing standing between Sayaka and the rogue Incubator. Any second now, she could take its life and end this whole thing—

"You also won't want to kill me," Xulbey shook its head.

"Give me one good reason."

"Because you need Madoka Kaname to save the world."

The blue and black Puella Magi wondered at the same time, _what did that have to do with anything?_ They had their own Incubator right here.

Sayaka started to speak, but Homura's lower, rhythmic voice came out first. "Sayaka and I will manage with what resources we have," she turned to the blue-haired girl and nodded, as if to apologize for what was said earlier. Sayaka didn't accept it entirely—it was a far cry from anything to make up for forcing tears—but it was enough for the moment. They were, as of this moment, allies. "Madoka will not become a Puella Magi," Homura finished.

Madoka's brow furrowed. Why did Homura care whether or not Madoka became a Puella Magi? Wouldn't that help them?

"You're not listening to me," Xulbey said, inflicting his words with the tone of an annoyed parent. "And you're being stupid. Madoka is the best weapon you have. Even if you don't want my help—which would be ridiculous considering that I'm the one who created Alice—you will need me if Madoka is to become the savior humanity needs."

'Madoka is the best weapon.' Homura had heard that far too many times to let that sit comfortably with her. She had worked too hard, fought too long and lost far too many times to accept such an answer. Her ears did pick up on something else, though. Something that _might_ change the way this war was playing out. Homura looked to Sayaka, then to Madoka. The three nodded, each girl aware of what was just said.

Kyubey remained motionless. To Homura, it meant the Incubator was scheming something…but in a rare first, _that_ Incubator was not the primary concern.

Madoka cleared her throat.

"What do you mean…you _created _Alice?"

A/N: Hey, all! You know the drill! Read and review away. If somebody told me writing a Madoka fanfic would be like juggling with razor blades…eh, I'd probably try it anyway.


	13. A Cyclical Magica

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

- A Cyclical Magica

"Alice is not an ordinary girl, but you all knew that by now," Xulbey started. Homura hated the way the Incubator carried himself in her own house: even faced with two Magical Girls that could kill him at a whim, and with his virtual doomday device out on the loose, Xulbey radiated couth. He wasn't just in charge of the situation; he _was _the situation. "And by that, I don't necessarily mean that she is a Puella Magi. That would make her in your leagues, and trust me, she is well beyond that."

"Quit with the condescention and get to the point," Homura shot at the black Incubator. "How did you _create_ Alice?"

The long pause as Xulbey twisted his head in her direction, like a puppet hanging from a twisted and frayed string, more than frightened Madoka. The silent Kyubey was but a stuffed-animal imitation of the demon before them now.

"Why Homura Akemi, surely you understand that this is all your fault."

"How do you—"

"Madoka Kaname was a normal girl with normal powers until you discovered something. Something _heinous_," Xulbey let the words resonate with an almost melodic beat in their minds. "Something that, at first, led to the deaths of your friends and everyone you loved."

Madoka saw the mysterious transfer student start to act in a way alien to her until now. The calm Homura clenched her fists; her lips pursed; her brow furrowed. She became tense, agitated...definitely _not_ in control of the situation.

"It created the deaths of that bloviating, justice-obsessed Mami Tomoe _and_ Madoka Kaname, and you couldn't handle that. Poor Homura Akemi, the transfer student who just wanted to have friends. It was too bad you couldn't make that contract ahead of time, to help save your friends from the Walpurgisnacht before they were basically eviscerated.

"And when you made that wish, you created in yourself a potential to change the rules. The potential to go back and keep the naïve, innocent Madoka from discovering what you did and enduring what you had to."

Madoka hoped that Homura would interject again, that Sayaka would try to shut him up, that Kyubey would do...something. None of this made sense. Though she didn't know where Mami was, Madoka knew that she, as well as herself, were alive and breathing. What were they talking about?

"So, since Homura herself isn't going to spit it out, I will.

"Homura Akemi's time travel powers stem from a wish to save Madoka from contracting, which, if you ask me, is a fate worse than death. And she could _not_ have that.

"And this is when you ask, Madoka Kaname...oh, and Sayaka too, if you feel like you still matter in this story," Xulbey seemed to smile in spite of his unmoving grin.

Madoka looked at Xulbey's paws. She couldn't gather enough courage to look him in his pulsating and beady emerald eyes. "I suppose..."

"Come _on, _Madoka," Xulbey prodded.

"I...what was the truth she—I mean, that Homura found out?"

Xulbey relished in the tension, knowing that Kyubey had nothing to say, that the girls were now subject to his brilliance...He watched as their faces froze, both the blue and pink-haired girls' thoughts racing. He wished he could know what they were asking themselves. After all, they were still only little girls. What was the most hellish fear they could imagine? And would that even compare to the truth that Homura had kept from them in this most important timeline?

He sat up straight. It was time to find out.

"Sayaka?"

The sapphire eyes darted to him.

"Have you ever wondered where witches from from?

…

As much as she hated to admit it, Mami Tomoe did enjoy being a hero. Maybe Kyoko had been right, and maybe Mami's beliefs did stem from the words that Kyubey initially put into her head, but that was as far as his influence went. Mami was the Golden Puella Magi; the one who protected those that walked down dark alleys at night. She had saved Sayaka's life not three days ago; how many other lives had been changed by one act of chance?

Even with witches—somehow without barriers and somehow causing so much death and destruction around them—surrounding and circling the three girls, Mami felt that something had been accomplished. She saw the movies; the three heroes walking into the firefight, cuing an awe-inspiring showdown with freeze-frame camera work and bloodied opponents. Like it or not, Mami was about to live it.

The small Yuma followed behind Mami and her adopted older sister, the gravity of what they were headed into finally sinking in. She had never seen this many witches before; she didn't even know that this many witches _existed_ in the world. She saw as the creatures of darkness ate into buildings, as they clawed and tore at human limbs, as they picked up and tossed cars like childrens' playthings...How many Magical Girls would it take to defeat all of them?

And what about that hole in the sky that seemed to be growing darker with every passing second?

Mami took Kyoko's cold, uncompromising hand as the three walked. She paid no mind to the growing army of hellspawn behind them.

"Yuma," Mami said in her honeysuckle voice, "I never told you about why I became a Puella Magi, did I?"

Yuma's hazel hair danced as the panicked girl shook wildly.

"Well, it was almost a year ago," Mami said. "I was going for a ride with my parents. I think we were going to an opera, because my mom was wearing the pearls that she never, ever let me touch. They were really pretty," Mami started to trail off.

Kyoko clenched the girl's hand. Mami continued, "Anyway, there was an accident. It was bad. Dad pulled into an intersection, and this truck was running the light...it all felt so slow, too. The car rolled onto its side, the glass shattered, and my parents...I don't know what their last words to me were, because the alarms were so loud.

"That's when I met Kyubey. He's another Incubator...Kyoko's Incubator," she remembered. "I only learned later that he gave girls a wish before they became Magical Girls. Me, I just wanted to live. There wasn't anything else that came to mind. I thought about it later, and I knew that I should have asked for my parents to be okay too, but I didn't think about it at the time, and..."

The streets grew hushed. There were no more screeching tires, no more screaming people, no more explosions. The witches that didn't hover above them like vultures followed behind them like lions, waiting for their prey to stop for the slightest second. They could sense the fear, the cold sweat and the realization of certain death coming from Yuma's shaken frame.

"Anyway, my parents had left everything in their will to me, and Kyubey pulled some strings to get me access to everything right away. But in return, he told me, I had to be a Puella Magi.

"So I asked, what does a Puella Magi do?

"And do you know what he said, Yuma?"

There was no answer. Kyoko squeezed the blond girl's hand tighter.

"He said that Puella Magi fight for other people. I think he tried to make it sound like a bad thing, like some kind of burden that I wasn't supposed to shoulder. He said, people are going to need you. You'll have no friends, and certainly no boyfriends...

"But I saw it differently.

"Kyoko laughs at me for this, but I saw it as a chance to help people. I mean, I had the power to keep other girls' parents from dying. It was me, nobody else, who could shoot muskets and ribbons at monsters that prowled the streets. How could I not help people?

"You get what I'm saying, Yuma?"

They had stopped walking. The girls stood in the middle of a blasted road, surrounded by scraps of cars and exploded water mains.

"Mams is laying it on a bit thick," Kyoko let their hands fall, each one tensed and prepared. "But she's getting at that whole 'power and responsibility' thing. Comic book stuff."

Kyoko's deep red eyes flashed back to Yuma—

"That doesn't make it any less true, though. I will give Mams that."

Two lights, one an uplifting gold and the other a definitive red, burst through the city, quickly joined by a jade shine behind them.

…

"You're lying!" Sayaka yelled. The rest of her body didn't seem to agree. She sat with Madoka now, her limbs lifeless and unwilling, while her mind shouted all kinds of insults. It wasn't true. There was no way that the Incubators were simply manipulating girls across time and space. It wasn't possible.

"I'd like to be," Xulbey said, his iconic cultured tone never waning, "But that is the truth. When the Soul Gem was too blackened, a Puella Magi would become a witch, and new girls would kill her. The cycle would perpetuate, and entropy was kept at bay.

"I have to say, if it weren't so terminally unethical, I would admire its engineers back home."

"Unethical?" Sayaka released a hollow laugh. "You're the one that's using us for war."

"You can't just make accusations like that without knowing all of the facts, dear," Xulbey lay down on the floor, growing more and more accustomed to telling the story from his own terms. "Allow me to educate you. If the Incubator and Homura Akemi have no objections..."

A thick pause flooded the room.

"Very well then," Xulbey began. "I, like others back home, knew that the Incubator profession was wrong. It's a common belief. Kyubey's been on Earth quite a while, so he's not exactly up to speed on the politics of this, but let's just say that there are proponents who think that, no, using these girls is not a wholly justifiable venture."

Madoka wanted desperately for Kyubey to interject. He did not.

"However," Xulbey continued nonchalantly, "What were we to do? We were just protestors. It's not like we could just stop the whole program.

"That is, until a cyclical magica exploded onto the scene."

...In that moment, for the first time in Madoka Kaname's young life, the world seemed to make sense.

She couldn't describe it; for the last fourteen years of her meager childhood, she struggled to understand what her purpose was. Like any other girl her age, she wanted to know. What was she supposed to do once she grew up? What was she supposed to be doing _now? _And was there anything she was doing that was _wrong_?

Knowing her friends, such as Sayaka and Hitomi, only kept her confusion at bay. It did nothing to curb her curiosity. The appearance of Incubators, the battles with Aoki Chika, meeting Alice and being here all meant nothing in the scheme of things. For this adventure, she was just a pawn, something to change hands between heroes of unspeakable power. But now, for the first time...

Madoka had _purpose_.

She knew, without having more than a hunch, that she was what had broken this system.

"A cyclical magica?" Madoka repeated.

"There had been time-travel powers before, but none that had gravitated around one girl. Time-travel powers usually never got far along enough to realize the kinds of things they were capable of.

"In other words, the girls died long before they figured anything out," Xulbey said quickly. "But as we all know, Homura Akemi is no ordinary Magical Girl. And even if her powers fell within the normal bell curve, her desire to protect said being as it became more and more cyclical.

"Repeating in a cycle, for the uneducated.

"Obviously, I'm speaking about Madoka," Xulbey said. "I suppose your Incubator can take this from here."

Kyubey was poised to strike, chiming in the second Xulbey's voice ceased. "Madoka, your powers come from Homura's rewinding time. Each time she did it, it was to save your life. But every time she did so, your potential to be a Puella Magi compounded. Right now, you have the power to destroy existence, if you so wanted."

"...If I so wanted?"

"You could obliterate Alice, if you desired it. I have no doubt."

"Your Incubator _lies_," Xulbey bellowed.

Sayaka recoiled, clutching her head in her hands to curb the boundless echo. In the tortorously-awkward silence, Xulbey stretched his back casually. "Not that he would know it, though. He hasn't seen what I have."

"That's rich," Sayaka grunted, her mind still battered from Xulbey's rapid-fire conversation. "The traitor is calling the rest of his species liars."

"They don't know the facts because they had not seen the last cycle."

Sayaka had tired of the run-around. "The last cycle of what?"

Xulbey paused, and Homura was sure it was just to be dramatic. "The last cycle of Homura Akemi's time-travel attempts. The one that she doesn't remember, because the one we find ourselves in now was not created by her in the first place, and in fact _overwrote_ that prior scenario.

"The one in which every Puella Magi in Mitakihara City was left dead, save for a helpless and utterly broken Homura, and a wishy-washy Madoka.

"The one in which Madoka contracted with Kyubey and, godlike, unleashed her full power upon Walpurgisnacht.

"I mean, you know...the one in which Madoka sacrificed herself for the sake of girls everywhere. As heroes are wont to do. Should I go on?

The intrigued stares—the most interested from Homura herself—was answer enough.

"This timeline saw Madoka realize that her power was intricately tied to the strength of her wish. In layman's terms, she could wish for literally _anything _in our reality. She chose to wish for the destruction of the witch mechanism.

"In what I saw as a truly ludicrous move, she summoned all despair in your Earth's space and time, and, empowered by both her wish _and_ the powers inherent in her newfound Puella Magi status, obliterated it.

"What she didn't think of—what none of my species thought could happen—was that this despair might gain consciousness.

"Now, obviously, despair only wanted one thing. Emotions rarely act for something other than their own sustenance. As such, you can imagine that the only thing it wanted was..."

"To kill me?" Madoka asked innocently.

"Not quite. I, having freshly arrived on Earth under the guise of any other Incubator, saw my opportunity.

"Contrary to popular belief, the Incubator rules do not specify that we contract pre-pubescent girls. They are simply the humans most capable of being manipulated. Any being capable of thought can be offered a contract."

Homura's monotone struck like a sharpened blade. "You offered a contract to the manifestation of pure evil, and it wished to become a human girl that could avenge itself."

"Precisely. This is where I admit my blunder: I assumed that I could control Alice as a weapon to fight Madoka in _this_ timeline. With the death of Madoka, I would control the strongest being in existence. The Incubator society would be mine.

"I even accounted for this girl being _too_ strong for one soul gem, thus splitting into Alice and Chika. All I had to do was control Chika like a normal girl, and Alice like the superior weapon she is.

"But...there were a few other complications."

"You didn't count on Mami and Homura and me, huh?" Sayaka offered belligerently.

Xulbey only scoffed. "Please...the difference is that here, in this timeline, Madoka Kaname has no real power. Not anymore. No more than any average Puella Magi."

This time, Kyubey was moved to words. Even he was powerless under Xulbey's calculating mind. "How is that possible? You just sat here and said that Madoka—"

"In the previous timeline, Madoka offered her existence to become the hope of all Magical Girls. Alice's creation, born of witch incarnate, voided that noble sacrifice by creating a new timeline. It's why witches still exist, after all.

"Madoka was reborn, but to my knowledge, her powers were reset. Her existence was completely re-written, as it were. I'd venture to guess that there's a fifty-fifty shot that Madoka contracts and obtains her old powers, which would only have grown _again _from yet another revival.

"Which is a tragedy, if I am right...because as it stands, Alice has gone out of control. The only way to—"

The actions were so fast; Madoka's nerves didn't have the luxury of recoiling. Xulbey exploded apart into a mass of stuffed black carnage. She couldn't even process the burst of light, and the swift motion of Homura pulling a weapon—

"I know you're still here," Homura lowered the handgun. "That's not enough to kill you."

"Quite right," Xulbey's voice came from behind her. "What was that for?"

"I just figured you out...and you're _still_ lying. You planned this from the beginning."

Xulbey twisted its nefarious head. "Whatever do you mean, Miss Akemi? Enlighten me."

"You wounded Kyubey so that he can't contract Puella Magi anymore. And you're not stupid enough to think that Alice wouldn't grow into her powers and lose her mind.

"Everything you've done has been to lead toward this moment," Homura said. And as the words left her mouth, their indisputable truth raced through her system. The unshakable Homura Akemi found it difficult to stand. Here they were, the Magical Girls of Mitakihara, and strong as they each were individually, one mind had them undone.

Homura could at least give Kyubey a run for its money. Their chess game lasted a month each time, and Homura almost won a few rounds. Xulbey had appeared once, and in a handful of days, had her conquered.

"Go on," Xulbey said, no longer bothering to hide his pride. This was his victory. "Tell the audience.

"What is my goal?"

Homura swallowed hard. Madoka caught her stealing a quick glance her way—

"You're the only one that can contract Madoka to defeat Alice...if your plan doesn't work and she has no power, the we're all dead, and there's no skin off your nose. You go back to your homeworld as Earth is consumed by the physical incarnation of its own despair.

"But if it does, and Madoka can kill Alice...then you own her. And unlike Alice, who's psychotic, Madoka will be herself. Perfectly sane...and basically, your doomsday device against the Incubators."

The lump in Madoka's throat was suffocating.

"One more thing," Xulbey said happily. "Tell the people why you can't just rewind time to remove Alice from existence, Homura."

"Remove Alice?" Madoka asked hopefully. If that was a possibility, why hadn't Homura tried it before?

"She hasn't told you?" Xulbey continued. "Each timeline is different. My own Kyoko Sakura and Yuma Chitose haven't even appeared in each one. Generating a new timeline will certainly undo the Alice abomination.

"So...Homura. Why can't you do just that? What's stopping you from foiling my flawless triumph?"

For the first time, Madoka saw an emotion in Homura resembling remorse—

"Because...if I go back and undo Alice, then she never creates this timeline."

Sayaka's voice was like rusted iron. "What are you saying..? Alice never creates a timeline where Madoka didn't just off herself?"

Homura nodded. Her gaze met Madoka's in the deepest apology the pink-haired child had ever known.

It finally sank in. If Homura went back in time and created a world where Alice didn't exist, then she would never revive Madoka. In fact, Madoka was alive now for only one reason...

To _maybe_ kill Alice, only to then be the contracted, Magical Girl Servant-Goddess of Xulbey, a rogue Incubator seeking revolution.

When Madoka raised her head, Xulbey's green eyes were digging into her.

"I believe this is checkmate," he said.

…

A/N: I return, and I bring updates with me. Thanks to anyone still around, after this long hiatus.


	14. A Wish to Save Us All

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

- A Wish to Save Us All

"Checkmate," Homura scoffed. "I don't believe that. Not for a second."

Xulbey couldn't physically frown, but Madoka imagined that if any featureless being needed to earn that right, it was this Incubator. "You disappoint me, Homura. I've just laid out a plot more diabolical than anything Kyubey had ever created, than anything he every _could_ create.

"Unless you are simply suicidal, I imagine you know that Madoka—"

Homura had listened to enough overly-confident blather for one day. She turned her attention to Sayaka, defeat absent in the sapphire-haired girl's eyes.

Sayaka gripped the edge of the sofa cushion, her passion sending shivers through Madoka's skin. All of this talk of alternate timelines, differing plans for the fate of her best friend, the creation of the Alice abomination, none of it really mattered. At this moment, in _this_ timeline, Sayaka had to protect a city. She had to protect her friend from chaotic space aliens…and all of her resources were in this room.

For the first time, Homura and Sayaka saw eye-to-eye.

"What's the plan?" Sayaka shot up like a rocket.

"We can't beat Alice on our own," Homura said coolly. "Tomoe is nowhere to be seen, but I know for a fact that she's still in town."

"How?" Madoka asked innocently.

"In no timeline has Mami Tomoe simply given up in the face of witches." Homura paused, and then added, "At least, not from having to _fight_ witches."

Madoka didn't ask for an explanation.

"If we can find Tomoe, we'll have three Magical Girls on our side," Homura continued, her plan obviously coming up on the spur of the moment. Not that Madoka could fault her for _anything_: not only was this the umpteenth plot to save her life, but it also came at the end of being outsmarted. Homura could never have expected this, but she could certainly react to it with skill. "With three of us, we might stand a chance."

"Ladies, would you stop being so foolish?" Xulbey scoffed. "You don't know how powerful Alice is. What's the idea, for Miki and Tomoe to defeat my perfect weapon? Hardly. Defeating witches is one thing, but fighting Alice is a hell far beyond their fate."

Xulbey's words fell on deaf ears. Only Madoka listened as the words broadcast through the air. She shifted in her seat, torn between the battle plans and the skeptic arguing that their efforts were a fruitless example of desperation.

That was hardly all of it, though.

…She was already dead?

…Worse than that, she was only here to bring the apocalypse?

That's what Xulbey had insinuated, at the very least. Alice was her equal and opposite reaction to the choices she had made in the past. Or rather, the choices that an alternate her had made in alternate worlds. But because they were all connected by one shared universe, that Madoka that had sacrificed herself to destroy witches was just as much at fault for Alice's existence as this Madoka right now, sitting on the couch with as much power as any other girl in eighth grade. The only reason she was brought back at all was because Alice wished for vengeance…

"Homura?"

Madoka chimed back into reality. She didn't know how long she had been distant; Homura and Sayaka were watching a holographic map along the wall and pointing to the horrifically-large concentrations of witches throughout the besieged Mitakihara. The only pairs of eyes concentrated on her were the bulbous red ones of Kyubey, and the ominous green set belonging to Xulbey.

She struggled to breathe.

"Homura," she asked louder. "I…I want to know."

Both Puella Magi turned to watch her.

"All of those people…everyone in trouble just outside your door…"

Her voice began to crack.

"It's all…it's my fault, isn't it?"

Homura was falling over herself as she raced for Madoka's sullen form—

"It's my fault that you've spent your life trying to beat the Walpurgisnacht, it's my fault that you've all died so many times, it's my fault that you became a Puella Magi and everyone out there dying right now is _all my fault _and—"

Battle-hardened hands fell on Madoka's and rested in her lap for a quiet second. The air in the room hung as Homura's violet eyes gripped Madoka's tight and refused to let them retreat into their meek shell.

"Listen to me, Madoka Kaname, and you listen well," Homura ordered. "None of this is your fault. None of this is _anybody's_ fault.

"Alice exists because _that_ Incubator wants to use you to rewrite reality. It's not the first time someone has come after you for that, believe me.

"But every time, I've been the one to create that scenario, to bring you to this same exact fate, every time."

Homura beat Xulbey to the chase. "It's my fault that the world is like this, and believe me, I've wrestled with that truth more than you will ever know.

"But…remember how Magical Girls are created?"

Madoka fought back tears. "You said…they're created from wishes."

"Right. Some of us with for ourselves, and those same girls end up dead before they can blink.

"But Sayaka Miki wished for someone else, and Mami Tomoe repents for her wish every day that she's breathing, in every timeline.

"Do you know what you've wished for, Madoka Kaname?"

She shook her little pink head—

"You made a wish to save us all. Each and every time, that was your motive. We three wanted to save people, but you wished _to_ save people.

"It's who you are, Madoka. It's why this is never your fault, and it's why we're all getting out of this alive.

"Now…before we go and save the world, is there anything you wanted to add?"

Sayaka cleared her throat. "I've got one," she said with a mock smile. "When do I get to beat Chika's face in?"

…

Mami Tomoe crashed not into or against, but _through_ the skyscraper from the force of the witch as it whipped her with its tendons with unfailing accuracy. As she soared to the ground hundreds of feet below, Mami fought against exhaustion and extended her crimson ribbons; the bands tied themselves around the antenna of another building nearby, allowing her to swing safely to the roof of a lower tower and catch her breath. The witch had ignored her after that mighty blow, instead choosing to resume its inhuman rampage.

Her every muscle screamed for mercy, but Mami Tomoe would go down fighting.

Mami's tired eyes scanned the area viciously. Somewhere in the few minutes between fighting the horde and being overwhelmed, she had lost sight of Kyoko and Yuma—

"Mami! Are you there? Come on, don't tell me I'm using this thing wrong…"

"Sayaka?!" Mami shouted. It took her a second to realize that the voice was from her mind. Sayaka was using the Puella-Magi telepathy link for the first time. "Sayaka, I can hear you. What is it? Are you alive?"

"Oh, we're just peachy over here. The world is just about to end, and we've been utterly _boned _by this Xulbey character, but beyond that—"

"Tomoe, this is Akemi," another voice rang out. "We have a plan, but we need more numbers. Where are you?"

"Homura Akemi," Mami said, her tone less than excited. "Isn't this a pleasant surprise. I suppose you want my help?"

"It's not about me," Homura fired back. "Alice is going to kill us all unless we can counterattack, but it's more difficult than that. Aoki Chika is in the way."

Mami hated having to talk to Homura in the arena of her mind, but she welcomed the chance to catch her breath. "Aoki Chika? I thought Kyoko killed her—"

"Like Sayaka told you, it's gotten complicated. We need to regroup."

Regroup? Easier said than done. She had to find her friends first, _then_ focus on saving the world. If Kyoko or Yuma were hurt from Mami's overzealous desire to protect everyone, she might never forgive herself. Mami paused. "I'm a little busy at the moment…"

"Where can we meet you?" Homura ignored the implied refusal in Mami's words.

Steel and concrete collapsed around her in all directions. Mami spun quickly, searching for the aggressor, but the bruises on her legs were screaming bloody agony—

"Mami! Help!"

—Yuma!

Mami sprang forth, ribbons launching into the air as she soared through dust and debris. She didn't know how far up she had flown, or how far the earth was below her, but it didn't matter. Her ribbons raced toward the voice—

The pulled taut—

"Mami!" Yuma shrieked as the ribbon whipped back, pulling the two girls together. The golden warrior could only catch a glimpse, but the wounds on Yuma's head alone didn't tell an optimistic story—

"Watch out!"

The dust cleared—

Below them, Mami laid eyes on a witch with the jaw of Cerberus and demonic claws, reaching out to rip them both to shreds. Mami knew she had to act fast, but she was past panic; she was trained.

Kicking her legs out with a dancer's prowess, Mami flipped over the witch just as her ribbon retracted. Yuma began to free-fall with her—

Mami's practiced hands went to work. With an impeccable skill, Mami reached out and took Yuma's little girl fingers into her own, pulling the child into her protection. And with the other—

"Eat lead!"

Mami's arsenal of muskets materialized around the witch's garish head, all unleashing their prepared shot the moment they appeared. The witch had no time to react; Mami had left no chances. The demon could only stay put as a volley of metal and pain pierced its flesh with a stinging agony. With an operatic scream, the witch fell back into the cloud and lay motionless.

One down.

Mami and Yuma landed gracefully onto another rooftop, this structure shorter than the previous one but already worse for wear; rubble and metal posts lay scattered, scarring the landscape. Another of these monsters could simply _breathe_ on it and the frame would come crumbling down…but for now, it could provide cover.

There was no defeat tonight. Defeat had never been an option, after all.

That kind of thinking would lead to disaster. Mami couldn't let herself focus on the doom and gloom, especially when there was a bleeding child lying next to her. Mami had landed on her feet and was ready for more; Yuma could hardly say the same.

The golden girl resisted looking at the fallen form beside her for as many precious seconds as she could. Seeing the wounds with her own eyes would make this all too real. She had felt the busted child bones when the ribbons brought Yuma to her; Mami had heard them snap inside Yuma's barely-developing body when they landed in an exhausted mess.

That wasn't even the worst part.

Though her limbs lay mangled by evil, Yuma remained cheerful…and oblivious.

Yuma's words were fine. Her brilliant voice rang out as casually as any other day. Hearing her cheerful tone come out of a crippled body nearly turned Mami's stomach inside-out.

"I can't find her," Yuma begged. "We got separated. I was screaming for her, but I couldn't…"

Every word buried Mami in her own personal coffin. "Kyoko's still out there," Mami managed. "I need to find her, but I'm not leaving you alone. Kyoko's strong; she can—"

"No!"

Yuma's screech bounded through the ruins of downtown Mitakihara. Mami turned to ice.

"No," the child repeated. "I…I'm the only reason she came here. Oni-chan's here because I've been ordered to be here." The words belonged in a confession at school, not a battlefield.

…Wait.

"Ordered?" Mami asked, knowing full well that she wasn't helping the situation any. A girl was bleeding out, and Mami wanted to ask her for details. A violent cough sent Yuma's body into spasms, and specks of red fluid onto the blasted ground. Mami knelt beside her and moved to cradle the dying warrior's head—

"I said, _no_," Yuma repeated, this time more gently. This time not with anger, but with resignation. Resignation that belonged to women far older than themselves. "It's all my fault. Mami, please listen to me.

"When I made my wish, I…I just wanted to have friends," Yuma said jubilantly.

"I ran away because I had no friends, Mami. I couldn't take it, and so I ran." Yuma closed her eyes and laughed a hollow laugh. "Crazy, right?

"After I met the kitty with the green eyes, I asked him to give me a friend…"

"That's when you met Kyoko," Mami whispered. She hadn't meant to.

"Oni-chan watched over me for so long, it almost felt like I had a family again. She was my best friend and my older sister…the two things I had always wanted…at the same time. She was the best…

"But," her voice started to fade out. Mami struggled to tune out the carnage in the distance. "The kitty showed up last week. We hadn't seen him in so long.

"He wanted me to come here," Yuma went on. "I didn't want to go, but…but Oni-chan and the kitty talked for a while, and they decided I needed to be here.

"But the worst part was…I actually wanted to be here. And I didn't know why." Yuma broke out into sobs; the tears mixed with the dust and crusted blood on her cheeks before they finally dropped to the ground. "I'm _supposed_ to be here, and this is all my—"

"Yuma, you are not allowed to finish that sentence," Mami forced out, summoning her last bastion of courage. She surprised herself; she worried that her voice might not work in the face of this magnitude of suffering. "We're getting out of here. What happened to us being a team?" She smiled weakly.

The sad smile of the shining Magical Girl did nothing against the impenetrable, inevitable sorrow within Yuma Chitose.

They were silent for a while. Even as the world burned around her, Mami heard nothing aside from Yuma's labored breath.

"When you find Oni-chan," Yuma started. Her voice was a desert where there once was life. "Tell her I'm sorry?"

Her smile hung as an unfinished portrait.

The world raced to Mami's mind all at once. All around her, people lay hurt and dying in the remnants of the once-lively Mitakihara City. A girl lay dead in her battered and defenseless arms; a witch could come up from any direction it chose and snuff Mami's life out like a cheap candle. Mami didn't exactly care.

…What was it all for?

And not in the cosmic, ridiculous manner. She had led Kyoko and Yuma here to save people, to do the job Mami had convinced herself was the path that these girls were meant to take. Not only had they been unable to save a single soul, but Kyoko had gone missing in action, Mami herself could scarcely raise a fist, and Yuma—

Mami hadn't the time to process the tragedy before her when footsteps clattered to the ground behind her. An all-to-familiar attitude of superiority had arrived at the worst time.

"Is everything okay over here?" Aoki Chika asked, a hand on her hip and an outstretched finger pointing at the crumbled girls. "You both seem a tad choked up over something."

When there was no reply, Chika circled around the two limp forms with a mocking, _insulting_ interest. She caught on quickly enough; the sobs falling onto Yuma's forehead as Mami cradled her friend told the tale.

"Oh, _that's_ what's going on," Chika said. "Death in the group. Sorry to hear. Not that I've ever had anybody around me die, but…I get the feeling it's a bit rough."

Pure adrenaline coursed through Mami's veins. Before she knew it, Mami's pain evaporated, eaten whole by the urge to destroy—

"You might be wondering how I'm alive," Chika put her pointed finger to her lip, trying and succeeding to be achingly cutesy. "You might not understand since you've made such an effort to keep yourself hidden, but…let's say I'm just half of the picture here.

"Granted, you and your friend don't look like much at the moment, either." Chika's shimmering green dress glowed against the gray death surrounding them. The same color that Yuma had embodied only a moment ago—

"But if I remember right," Chika though back, "Don't you not know her? Girls are weird."

Mami rose to her feet—

"I mean, why cry over some girl you don't even know? It's kind of stupid, really—"

"I'll show you what's kind of stupid!" Mami growled, her strength renewed. Kyoko had to still be out there; there were other things that she had to do right now. Fighting another Magical Girl wasn't worth it—

Chika's hammer sprang forth from her pristine headband. "It's your move, pigtails," she gloated.

…

"We've got a plan, then!" Sayaka slammed her fist into her hand. The girls stood by the door, poised and ready for action. The Incubators had both grown quiet as Homura struggled to come up with a plan of attack. Even under pressure, she managed well enough to energize her companions into motion.

"I have to admit," Xulbey said, "I'm impressed."

"Are you still here?" Sayaka laughed. "The three of us have a job to do, so if you don't mind, I'm pretty sure Homura doesn't want you two here when she gets back."

"Right, because you'll survive," Xulbey replied. "Your plan relies on finding Tomoe, and then having you and yellow simply _stall for time_ against my invincible weapon, while Homura somehow defeats the animal that is Aoki Chika.

"Do you even know where to find your third Musketeer?" Xulbey twisted its head, interested.

"She's downtown somewhere," Sayaka said boldly. As the seconds passed, Sayaka grew more and more confident. She _was_ a Puella Magi. Mami had introduced her into this world for a reason, and this moment was it. "We'll use that mind-power-thingy to find her from there, and then we're good to go. Right?"

Sayaka looked to the black Puella Magi for assurance. Homura's no-nonsense violet eyes announced more certainty than any words could. Beside her, Madoka wringed her hands hurriedly, fighting to balance a fine line between optimism and anxiety. Mami, Sayaka, and Homura could do this. They could defeat Chika and Alice, and it would all be over before she knew it. Madoka could go back to her sketch book, back to school, back to the world they all knew. Sayaka could run off with her new violin-playing boyfriend, and Homura could move on with her life.

"Good luck, ladies," Xulbey added. He jumped from the furniture to stroll along the white, featureless floor, under Kyubey's accusing eye. "I do hope you find Mami before Aoki Chika does."

Homura furrowed her brow—

"Because we all know how that will end, don't we?"

A/N: This chapter was _very_ difficult to write. Fight scenes are very much not my forte, and well…review, folks! Constructive criticism is always welcome.


	15. Beyond Imagination

Puella Magi: A Cyclical Magica

…

- Beyond Imagination

Chika twirled the hammer from side to side like a cheerleader's baton, whirling it happily as though she were the unquestionable center of attention. Every passing second made Mami's urge to strike more powerful, her thirst for retaliation more unstoppable. She forced herself to breathe, to not even look at the Puella Magi before her and simply _process_. Taking her anger out on another girl wouldn't help anything.

Furthermore, even _if_ there were a reason for her to attack, Mami's first thought was of their previous battle. Mami had been more than defeated; she had been nearly _humiliated_, her limp form sent careening to the ground in a grotesque display of weakness. If some time had passed, maybe Mami could assume that she had grown stronger, that perhaps the playing field had been leveled enough that another battle could end differently. But no; that battle was barely twenty-four hours ago, and the only difference was that unlike then, Mami was _already _exhausted.

…Mami dialed it back. This _was_ Xulbey's puppet. One that had no reason to still be alive. How could this be good news? The city crumbling, the skies ripping apart and Homura and Sayaka's working together _had_ to play into it somehow. But if that were true, wouldn't the two of them be trying to contact her again somehow?

"Are you going to attack me?" Chika groaned. "Or are you going to just stand there and play dead?

"Whoops!" She put a fluttery hand over her taut smile. "That was a touchy subject, I think."

Mami showed no reaction either way. Not the reaction Chika had been hoping to goad, but there was more than one way to bait prey.

"How did we get like this?" she laughed. "Come on, Tomoe. I thought we could be like, I dunno, rivals or something. I nearly kill you but then _I_ end up dead, _you_ nearly kill _me_ and then _you_ end up in a grave, and so forth. It could all be good fun.

"Good, childish fun," Chika licked her canine teeth. "For girls of all ages, even the little green dead ones."

"I'm not falling for this," Mami said. The words came fast, like lightning; if she slowed to hear herself, she might lose control and be taken over by her emotions. The Mami Tomoe that cried for others, that tried so hard to protect others was taking a forced vacation. Chika was _not_ to be taken lightly. "Insult Yuma all you want…it won't work."

"Oh?" Chika giggled. "What is it you think I'm trying to do?"

Mami remained unflinching. "I think you want me to fight you," she said. "Because you want to kill me."

"Do I really? I just said we could be friends."

This was going nowhere fast; if Mami didn't do something, she'd lash out and attack, or fall under her own shoulders. She had to use her anger somehow...so Mami did what she knew Kyoko would do in this situation: banter. And banter well.

"You want to kill me," Mami went on, "Because you know I'm a threat."

Chika's eyebrows flew upward. "How do you figure that? Did you miss what happened when I—"

"I might not be able to live twice, or come back like you did…but I've got something different from you and Xulbey," Mami paused. "Something that keeps me from giving into you."

"And what's that supposed to be, princess?"

"Morals, Aoki Chika."

Chika pursed her lips. "I'm listening," she sang.

Mami closed her eyes. She felt her chest heave, felt the air flow through her…and spoke with clarity. "Unlike you and your kind, I know the difference between right and wrong. I know that I am what I am, and that unlike so many other girls my age, I can't change my fate. I live here and now.

"But unlike those girls, I don't hate myself the way I think you do."

Chika's expression gradually furrowed and twisted, going from banal amusement to mild annoyance. What would Kyoko do? Go deeper.

"How dare you," Chika growled. "You don't know anything about me."

"I never claimed to—"

"And who are you to judge anybody else? You're no different from the rest of us, Mami Tomoe. You're just another girl who made one pathetic wish, and now you're utterly screwed. Just like the rest of us," she repeated.

And for the first time since this adventure began, from when Kyubey told her about Xulbey's plot, to asking for Sayaka's help, to reconnecting with Kyoko Sakura to now…finally, Mami knew that she could win.

One fact changed everything.

For once, she could be proud of herself.

"Chika, I didn't make a wish like other girls.

"When I met Kyubey, it was after I had been in a car crash. My parents' were already dead in the front seats. The head-on collision was impossible to…

"Anyway. Kyubey appeared, and before he could even say anything, I begged him to save my life. And I mean, he could have been anything. A dust mote, a fly, a police officer or a bystander. I just wanted to live, and I wanted to beg for it."

Chika folded her arms, her impatience showing through. "What are you on about?"

"When I woke up in the hospital, Kyubey explained everything to me. About how my human life ended, and the powers I had.

"A few days later, the lawyers decided that the daughter of a wealthy politician didn't need the full protection of the state. They could invest her money and put her on an allowance until eighteen, and her wellbeing was instantly taken care of.

"Now, if I were like _you_," Mami found the energy to tilt her head and smile gently, like she had seen Kyoko do so many times. "Or other girls like you, I might have never used my powers again. Outside of getting the occasional grief seed, of course. But I'm loaded, you know. I could take off and enjoy life.

"So…do you know why I'm here?"

Chika scrunched her lips like a spoiled child on Christmas.

"I'm here because I want to do good. I want to save people. I have the power to keep other people—men, women, boys, and other girls—from suffering what happened to me. I have more grief seeds than I know what to do with, because I don't care about them. I fight for more than myself."

She stole a quick look to the fallen friend behind her—

"I fight for those I barely know. I fight for anyone I could have ever known, because they would have relied on me. Just like I would have relied on them. It's what friends would do.

"So no, Aoki Chika. I'm _nothing_ like you. And because I'm nothing like you, you and Xulbey can't understand me or anything about me.

"That scares you.

"And if you're scared of me, you can't truly defeat me.

"And so you all _think_ you can kill me, and if I believe it, that might happen. But I doubt it."

Time to seal it—

"You can't convince me to go along with working for Xulbey, and you can't kill me…so you have to make me doubt myself. Make the only thing you fear somehow fear you. It's what bullies at my school do to people every day. It's pathetic, Chika.

"And once you see through it, you see a bully for what she is…a cowardly shell of a person."

Mami sealed her lips tight, afraid to over-do it.

Chika's rage boiled over like an active volcano, rising first from her legs as they quivered, then to her hands as she gripped the hammer with no uncertain intentions, and finally to her expression. Her wide eyes lost all of their playfulness; her sharp smile closed behind a furious grimace.

"But if you think this show if yours isn't just talk," Mami said with a stuttering inhale, like a babe about to sob. Time to man up or shut up. "Be my guest."

This was it—

In the blink of an eye, Chika was in the air, hammer extended and ready to bring death. Mami braced herself for the fight of her life…but she wasn't yet through.

After all, if worse came to worse, she still could use _that_ attack.

…

Homura led the other two girls as they ran through the deserted city streets, taking special care to avoid bright lights or voices. Three teenage girls would definitely be picked up by authorities and brought to safety, and that would ironically be the worst possible thing for the city.

"It sucks we can't just, you know, _fly_ or something," Sayaka said, her lungs heaving and ready to explode. She held the billowy middle of her dress in clenched fists. Were they to make the whole trip in their Magi forms, Alice could pick up on them…if Xulbey were to be believed. "And you know, my outfit was very definitely not made for this stuff."

Madoka wanted to apologize, but didn't want a repeat performance of the 'cheer up Madoka' choir. Having people yell at her for apologizing was almost as bad as having to apologize to begin with. The two Incubators followed behind, Xulbey joining in Kyubey's eerie silence. He, like Kyubey moments before, had resigned to letting the events play out. Words could only do so much, and in the face of these witches and these girls, only actions could sway Mitakihara's fate. And though she couldn't fight like her friends, Madoka wanted to be as helpful as she could. If she was _ever_ going to help anyone…

"Homura?" She asked between gasps, pink pigtails flopping in and out of her vision. "Have you found Mami yet?"

"No," Homura's voice was controlled and unconstrained. She might as well have been standing perfectly still. "When we reached her before, she was in the middle of downtown, but that might have changed."

"What, you can't just, like, mind-meld with her again?" Sayaka asked. Sweat dripped down her back. Great, she thought. Her mom was going to _love_ having to pay to clean this dress after just one half-date.

"It doesn't work that way," Homura replied in a more demanding voice. "Using telepathy between Puella Magi requires concentration. She has to be able to focus on us. Not on whatever is coming for her."

Madoka was glad she couldn't see Xulbey's reaction…though the rogue Incubator likely didn't have one, though. It never did.

The three passed the last civilian checkpoint, and with it, the last bastion of the once-bustling Mitakihara City. Madoka's eyes drifted to the tears in the purple and bruised clouds overhead; witches had stopped raining down in an apocalyptic torrent, now settling to drift down like lonely snowflakes on a cold morning. The skyline before them had been leveled; they only had a little while before the damage would spread.

"I don't get it," Sayaka huffed, her breath now painfully labored. Madoka was amused despite herself; even as an invulnerable Magical Girl, Sayaka was still her lazy best friend. "We _just_ talked to Mami. She sounded fine! I mean, a little stressed out, but—"

"Back! Now!"

Homura's street clothes were gone in a flash bright like the sun itself, and before Madoka could see her protector again, she was falling back from a vicious push. She caught herself against the pavement, with Sayaka holding onto her to keep balance. When she stole a quick look back, Madoka found that Kyubey and Xulbey had vanished. And before them…

"You!" Sayaka said in a disgusted whisper. The sapphire Magical Girl took a fighting pose, and despite the lack of her armor, she conveyed a very-real certainty. The light had cleared; Homura stood in her black garb, shield first, protecting the three of them and ready for combat.

…Which made no sense, in Madoka's opinion. She had never seen this Puella Magi before, but as far as she could tell, this red-haired one couldn't hurt a fly. She could barely stand: the sides of her skin-tight uniform were black from rubble and blood, to say nothing of the marks on her face and exposed calves. She braced herself against a nearby building and struggled to breathe. Mounting an attack was impossible.

Not that Madoka had much experience in this kind of thing, though.

"Me, yeah," Kyoko Sakura sighed. "I surprise myself too, from time to time." She let go of the building and attempted to step forward; bracing herself again on the same structure kept her from landing face-first into broken pavement. She laughed despite herself. "Though admittedly, I've seen better days."

"What do you want?" Sayaka said, her words like ice.

Kyoko attempted a smile; it did nothing but show off her bloodied mouth. "I thought we could work together. You know, there's all of these witches around…Mams and Yuma are missing…the clouds think they're supposed to be donuts…

"Like I said, it's been one of those days."

The smile turned to a distraught grimace. Kyoko looked to Sayaka and Homura for some kind of sign, some kind of emotion to read, but could only find hard, punishing stares. At any moment, either of these other girls were liable to run her through with a blade. This was going nowhere, fast, and Kyoko didn't have that kind of time.

The meek-looking girl in the back…she was something different altogether.

"What are you supposed to be?" Kyoko said, trying to mask the distinct gagging sound of blood welling in her throat. She could no longer point with an annoyed finger; Kyoko simply nodded her head in the others' direction. "Tweedle-dee and Tweedle-dum are here, and then there's this pink powder-puff in the back…

"Don't tell me you're Madoka Kaname," Kyoko said. As soon as the words escaped her lips, she knew she had hit the right vein. Sayaka was on her in an instant, rapier drawn and racing toward the wounded girl. Only Homura's voice ended the moment—

The command was mighty, and yet barely even present. "Sayaka," Homura said in a low whisper. That was all she needed; Sayaka landed on her feet, the rapier an inch away from Kyoko's throat. The crimson Puella Magi didn't even bother to move, and Madoka couldn't be sure if that was from bravery or straight inability.

"Are you insane, transfer student?!" Sayaka yelled loudly enough that every witch in the city could hear. "Do you know who this _is_?"

"Kyoko Sakura," Homura replied. "Another Puella Magi—"

"Right! She tried to kill Mami!"

Kyoko rolled her eyes with a deal of effort. "Looks like _someone_ skipped a few chapters."

Sayaka's teal eyes glared at her, with a quality harder than diamonds.

"I would never hurt Mams, and honestly," Kyoko stopped to catch a few labored breaths, "I'm offended that I'm being accused of it.

"And you," Kyoko directed her attention to the black Magical Girl. "How do you know my name? I've never met you in my life."

"But you've met Mami Tomoe," Homura said, quickly shifting gears. Madoka mentally applauded how easily she had avoided bringing up other, grittier topics. "And if I'm not mistaken, your Incubator was Kyubey, meaning you're on our side."

"I don't have a side, you moron," Kyoko scoffed. "I'm just trying to find my friends."

"Tomoe is our friend as well," Homura continued. "We need her help. Can you help us?"

Kyoko couldn't believe her ears. This was something out of a particularly-bizarre nightmare. "_You_ need her help…you're kidding. I'm getting us out of dodge before it's too late, and you three bimbos should do the same."

"There's nowhere to run," Homura said. "If we don't stop Alice now—"

"Alice? That's what you kids are calling it these days," Kyoko laughed. The hollowness of it shook Madoka's core; this, she realized, was what it was like to talk to the dying.

"It?" Madoka repeated.

"Yeah, _it_, pigtails. I've never known about a witch that could do all this, but if that's what Xulbey was getting at, then—"

Sayaka put her rapier back in the holster. What was Kyoko going to do, get blood on her tunic? "Alice isn't a witch, she's a Puella Magi. She's the one that's causing all of this," Sayaka waved around the wreckage, then turned to Kyoko with a raised eyebrow. "Now who's the one that didn't do the reading?"

"Don't get coy, blue bomber," Kyoko groaned. "Xulbey never said anything about some Alice chick."

…It was incredibly subtle.

The change in Homura's calculating, confident demeanor dropped in the same way a pin falls into a haystack. A glimmer of something alien, something uncommon in Homura Akemi flashed through her eyes. It was as though she were remembering a dream, or maybe even a nightmare that she had since forgotten. And as soon as she remembered it, the defenses rose back up, the calculations began again, and Homura went back to action. Only someone who knew her better than she knew herself could have recognized it.

Madoka Kaname had seen it—the flash of unbridled fear as it ripped through Homura's mind.

Sayaka had continued to bicker, refusing to give Kyoko an inch. "Were you smoking when you teamed up with that megalomaniac? Alice is the end-all-be-all of this. He said it himself. Conniving cretin he is."

"I'm telling you, kid. I've never heard of any Alice—"

"No," Homura said. "She's telling the truth, Sayaka."

Kyoko and Sayaka looked at her, blue and red staring intently into the same violet eyes.

"Kyoko, what Xulbey warned you about…he called it a Walpurgisnacht, didn't he?"


End file.
